Newport Mage
by Quatermass
Summary: (Based on Manga continuity) He is the Master of Death from another world. She is the cyborg commander of Public Security Section 9. Join Harry Potter, Motoko Kusanagi, and the rest of Section 9 as a heady mix of investigations, conspiracies, and magic unfold...
1. Foreword

**FOREWORD**

Waytodawn0 once suggested that I do a crossover between Harry Potter and _Ghost in the Shell_. Now, to date, there's only one such crossover, and it's not only seemingly abandoned, but it hasn't even managed to incorporate any elements from _Ghost in the Shell_ proper, as far as I can tell.

After some considerable thought whether to do a story involving a younger Harry somehow ending up in the _Ghost in the Shell_ universe (namely the _Stand Alone Complex_ version), or having an older Harry end up working for Section 9, I decided on a variant of the latter. However, I also decided that Harry would end up in the _Ghost in the Shell_ universe in much the same way as he does in my other work: _Nitimur in Vetitum_. There, Harry ends up in Ivalice (two years before the events of _Final Fantasy XII_ ), and was another iteration of the 'Master of Death' version of Harry (namely immortal). My version of Harry there was inspired by the version in the crossover with _Mass Effect_ titled _Getting Too Old For This_ by ManMadeOfLasers.

After some thought, I decided to use the same backstory for Harry from _Nitimur in Vetitum_ (where his family has been wiped out by the Death Eaters, and he ended up being pushed through the Veil). I also decided to use the manga version of _Ghost in the Shell_. Why? Well, a few reasons. I haven't watched _Arise_ , I don't have easy access to the episodes of _Stand Alone Complex_ at the moment, and I think the films got a little too much into the navel-gazing, and don't have enough story. However, I do have two of the three manga volumes (I don't have _Human-Error Processor_ , aka _Ghost in the Shell 1.5_ ), and I like the comedy Masamune Shirow put into the manga. This story will start in chapter 3 of the manga, _Junk Jungle_.

Anyway, time for the usual annotations. Firstly, there will be spoilers for _Ghost in the Shell_ and Harry Potter. You have been warned.

Secondly, there will also be heavy annotations. Hell, this is pretty much me doing what Masamune Shirow does. In any case, I'd better not hear any bellyaching. If you feel the urge, smother it.

Thirdly, this is an M-rated work. There'll be coarse language, violence, and sex. If you've read the manga, you'll know why. Indeed, this story starts in the chapter with one of the most infamous scenes from the manga. So yeah, you've been warned.

Finally, the following is a fan-based work. Harry Potter and _Ghost in the Shell_ are the property of their respective owners. Please support the official release. Otherwise, Motoko will hack your brain and make you do embarrassing things…


	2. Chapter 1: The Mysterious Flatmate

**CHAPTER 1:**

 **THE MYSTERIOUS FLATMATE**

 _It is the year 2029. The world has become highly information-intensive, with a vast corporate network covering the planet, electrons and light pulsing through it. But the nation-state and ethnic groups still survive._

 _And on the edge of Asia, in a strange corporate conglomerate-state called 'Japan'(_ _1)_ _…_

* * *

Major Motoko Kusanagi (not her real name by any means(2), but the one she answered to now) of Public Security Section 9 enjoyed an intriguing mystery. It was one of the reasons why she began transitioning from a military career into something that was closer to police work. It was why she was the commander of Public Security Section 9, formed three months ago after a near-disaster of a pilot operation to investigate the Sacred Citizen Relief Centre(3). An anti-terrorist group, it also looked into various cybercrimes and the like.

One of those mysteries resided in one of the apartments she resided in, and was currently taking her leave in. The cheerfully cynical young British man with messy black hair, green eyes, and a fading scar on his forehead, in the shape of a thunderbolt. The young man had bought the apartment outright, not long before she moved in, and allowed her to stay for a suspiciously low rent for such a good apartment.

She investigated him, using what channels she could through Section 9, and found enough to intrigue her, and arouse her suspicions. You could see the signs of a bought identity. It wasn't necessarily a false one: marrying what she had observed of her flatmate's behaviour (he insisted on being called that rather than, in a way, her landlord) with the facts suggested that he had actually lost his identity papers, and had merely bought them. He was no cyborg (he claimed to have a medical condition that would make it dangerous to even get his brain cyberised), no cyborg-hater (he thought she was cool), and seemed too damned cheerful for his own good.

Motoko didn't know what to make of her flatmate. He had aroused her suspicion and her curiosity. Indeed, he had done that with Aramaki and Batou, too, if only because her flatmate concerned her slightly. If he was a criminal, then he was hiding it, behaviour-wise, better than most. In fact, if she didn't know any better, he moved like a policeman. No, actually more like someone from Section 9, like he was used to covert ops. Enquiries to the British turned up nothing. Or rather, nothing of any use. There were various people by that name, true, but none from any kind of records matching up to her flatmate. And he had recently opened an account, using a ridiculous amount of gold as a deposit, meaning he was one of the richest men in Newport. And he had no known job, save for a part-time one in a virtually-obsolete paper media library.

And yet, the flatmate was a genuinely nice guy, once you got past the occasional cynical moods and the more frequent impish sense of humour that led him to occasionally prank her. True, he had forced the TV to stay on the same channel (BBC Classic, in the middle of a _Doctor Who_ marathon) for an entire day, and she didn't know how he managed that, given that she should have been able to counterhack whatever commands he had used on the TV. Or that time he had managed to sneak into her room, and left her made up like one of the members of that old band KISS.

And yet, on the few times she was both willing and able (the latter due to the laws surrounding the secrecy of Section 9) to talk about her job, he listened. He was a good listener. And he was also an excellent cook, making synthetic food for cyborg nutrition taste like a feast. And to tell the truth, some of his jokes and antics made her laugh. Like when Batou came around once, and her flatmate quipped, " _Are those monocles or something?_ " Motoko and Batou both laughed their heads off at that one.

Still, Harry Potter was a mystery to Motoko Kusanagi, and one day, she would find out what that was. One day, when they first began investigating the Puppeteer…

* * *

"So, let me get this straight," Harry said, peering at the bank of electronics on the wall. "You're making lesbian cybersex porn in a virtual environment?"

Motoko's friend Kurutan nodded. "It's called Endorno. A sort of virtual experience software catering to E-brain cyborgs, where one can basically become any participant in a same-sex experience. Motoko, being a full-body cyborg with top of the line specs for her tactile abilities, is perfect for such a thing. It's technically illegal, given the electronic drugs we take to enhance the experience…"

"But relatively harmless?"

Motoko smiled. "Well, unless you're a man who's plugged into this by accident. It's actually quite lucrative. Don't worry, my bosses are okay with it. Anyway, I intend to spend my leave enjoying myself. If you want to, you can watch it on the screen. We sell videos as well."

Harry laughed, despite himself. "Oh, Padfoot would be drooling!"

Padfoot, Motoko had learned earlier, was the _nom de guerre_ of Harry's godfather, who had the improbably astronomical name of Sirius Black. When she had asked Harry about this, he said that his godfather's family was very isolated and had a bizarre tradition of naming their members after stars and constellations. He also hinted that they were both inbred and not very nice people at all. In any case, the nickname had come about while Black had been a notorious prankster at a school both he and Harry attended.

"Actually, it'd be good if you kept an eye on the safety systems," Kurutan said. "We do inside Endorno, but it doesn't hurt to have someone to pull the plug in case anything does go badly wrong."

"Okay, sure," Harry said with a shrug.

"And keep an ear out for the phone," Motoko said. "I may be on leave, but I wouldn't put it past the old ape to cancel it all of a sudden."

* * *

Harry divided his attention between the monitor showing the, um, _action_ (Motoko and her two friends really enjoying themselves, it seemed, with their little romp), and the monitor showing the security and safety systems (all green), as well as the currently sleeping physical bodies of the participants (though they occasionally emitted a moan of pleasure, synchronised with one from the screen). Ah, the strange joys of the future. Or at least one of them. It seemed to be pretty different to his world, in terms of history. For example, in this world, there had been two more fairly brief World Wars (for a grand total of four), and cybernetics was more advanced than it was back home.

Still, it was a place to make a new start, after everything that had gone so badly wrong back home. After Ginny and the kids, as well as most of his friends, were murdered by would-be Death Eaters seeking revenge for their idol's death. After it was revealed he was the Master of Death, or rather, her chosen. After a fearful populace ordered he be dumped through the Veil. And after he woke up, sprawled naked in an alley.

Thankfully, after he got word of what was to happen, he liquidated his account at Gringotts, put it all into a special mokeskin pouch (along with his other prized possessions), and used a shrinking charm on it, all before swallowing it, on the offchance that, should he survive this, he would have something to use.

And Sirius would be jealous. His flatmate was a hot purple-haired(4) bisexual(5) cyborg woman who was the member of some special forces unit, not unlike SWAT of the future. Not that Harry had made much in the way of a move yet, but Motoko had indicated that the door was open. He wasn't quite ready yet, though. The ghost of Ginny Weasley and his own children still haunted him. Figuratively rather than literally, but even so…

Suddenly, the security monitor began blinking. Before Harry could do anything, Motoko convulsed. On the screen, briefly, Motoko's face, in the throes of an orgasm, was superimposed with the startled face of Batou. Then, Motoko sat bolt upright, her eyes wide, the cable connecting her to the device falling from the port on the back of her neck. "Oh…my…gosh…" she murmured.

The monitor which, until now, had been showing Motoko and her friends engaged in a lesbian cyber-threesome, had gone blank, and as Motoko's friends roused from where they were sprawled on bean bags, it then showed a view in some sort of forested area. The familiar voice of Batou emitted from the speakers. " _Uggghhh…got an awful sensation in my gut…good thing I haven't got a terminal there…feels like it's filled with slugs fucking each other senseless…Jeez, Major, what are you…_ "

Motoko scowled, and Harry saw a fist suddenly slam into the 'camera' of the scene on the monitor. It seemed that somehow, it was showing Batou's viewpoint. Then, although Motoko didn't speak out loud, her voice emanated from the speakers. " _Batou, tell me why you just interrupted my leave now, or I'll make you hit yourself again._ "

" _Your leave's cancelled. Chief's orders. Report to Flat Number 17 for briefing. You'll be with Togusa._ "

" _Tell the old ape I'll be there in 20_ ," Motoko said, before switching off the device. She then looked at her friends, her scowl fading to be replaced by a contrite look. "Sorry, girls, my leave's been cancelled."

"Motoko, this always happens!" Kurutan scowled. "You promised!"

"I know, but duty calls, and the drugs have been locked out of my system," Motoko said apologetically. "When I'm back on leave, I'll call you. Bye!"

Kurutan huffed and pouted. "Dammit…this always happens."

"What, a male cyborg fucking up an all-female sex romp?" Harry asked.

"Well…no. That was the first time that happened, and frankly, it usually happens only once we're done with a session, thankfully. Even so…" Kurutan scowled. "And here I was thinking my work at the hospital was demanding…"

* * *

After Motoko's friends left, disappointed and annoyed, Harry decided to go for a walk. First, some lunch, and then, he would have a look at a couple of the nearby markets.

As he walked the crowded streets of Newport, he found his mind going back to Motoko. She had divulged little about her own past (then again, he hadn't told her much about his own beyond credible generalities), but apparently she had been a full-body cyborg since she was a young girl. What it must be like to be almost entirely metal and plastic for almost your whole life, save for your brain and spine? Changing bodies as you grew up in much the same way normal children would change the size of their clothes? Harry wasn't sure of her age, though given what time the full-body prosthetics came out in this world, she was in her early thirties at her oldest. Ironically, he looked younger than that…but he was forty-nine, the year of this world matching up to his own.

And he felt much, much older, given all the losses he had suffered.

* * *

After lunch, and looking through one market, Harry happened to be wandering near a man who was apparently making a phone call. Harry noticed, however, that the rather shifty character had stuck some sort of device to the underside of the public phone. He schooled his expression suitably. Unfortunately, it became a moot point when a garbage truck, moving at ridiculously high speed, turned the corner. He was sure it didn't hit anything, and yet, he knew he heard a brief clang! The garbage truck driver was hollering, apparently at the man who Harry had just seen depositing the device. Said man drew out a pistol and began shooting at the truck, fading away using optic camouflage.

As the truck veered, everything seemed to slow. Harry saw the garbage truck, as it veered, knock something out of the way, something that faded into visibility. A spider-like mechanical tank, something he had seen on the news. An AI tank known as a 'Fuchikoma'. Then, he saw that a young woman pushing a pram was in danger of getting hit by the truck. With that, his course was clear. He ran to the woman, and shoved her and the pram out of the way of the truck.

Only to get hit by it himself.

The garbage truck had been going at a fair whack of speed when it happened, and it hit him with considerable force, sending him flying like a ragdoll. With a certain detachment, Harry felt his neck break and his ribs shatter, poking through his chest like the spikes of some demonic animal. He rolled on the ground once, twice, thrice, before coming to a halt in a pile of garbage bags. The last thing he heard before the darkness claimed him was, surprisingly, Motoko screaming his name…

* * *

Motoko Kusanagi fought down the urge to murder that son of a bitch who caused Harry to die. How Harry ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time while they were trying to track the user of that HA-3 virus, she didn't know. What she did know was that Harry was dead, his body sprawled and broken amongst the garbage bags. You cannot survive with your neck at that angle.

Still, she intended to bring that bastard in alive. Nobody said it shouldn't be painful, though…

* * *

Revival was always painful. This was perhaps the fifth time it had happened to him, and the second time in Newport (the first time being a drugged-up paranoid mugger who blew Harry's head off). Harry lurched to his feet, before he shook his head. Looking at the astonished onlookers, he pulled out his wand and sent Memory Charms their way. Then, he dashed down an alley, smelling the gunsmoke. He then murmured, "Point me, Motoko."

The wand pointed to the very market he was heading to before everything went sour. He dashed there, only to find Motoko, clad in a figure-hugging combat uniform and body armour, leaping down to confront the man who had shot the garbage truck. "Police! Out of the way!"

Even as she did so, sending the shooter flying, he snarled, "She ain't no cop! She's trying to kill me!"

Harry realised, as a small crowd of bystanders tackled Motoko to the ground in a scrum, that the fugitive had used a Hypno-Voice, a fairly sophisticated cyberbrain hack. But as he raised his gun to shoot Motoko, Harry raised his own gun, and roared, " _EXPELLIARMUS!_ "

The gun flew from the man's hand, and into Harry's own. He stared at Harry, as did Motoko, wrestling around in the grip of those people to stare at Harry from beneath a visor. Then, Harry pointed his wand at the fugitive, and bellowed, " _PETRIFICUS TOTALUS!_ "

With a cut-off squawk, the fugitive collapsed to the ground like a felled tree. But as everyone in the market turned to look at him, Motoko and a newly-arrived young man in the same combat uniform as Motoko included, Harry knew he had a LOT of explaining to do. I mean, it wasn't every day that someone came back from the dead, and still had a line of drying blood from his mouth to prove it…

 **CHAPTER 1 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Much of the previous was based on Chapter 3 (** ** _Junk Jungle_** **) of** ** _Ghost in the Shell_** **. Yes, even the sapphic cybersex threesome, as fans of the manga will know. Masamune Shirow apparently wanted to do a sex scene, but didn't want to draw a man's arse. The background to it was taken from his annotations for the manga. So if you think it's gratuitous, blame Masamune Shirow.**

 **Anyway, I hope you've enjoyed what I've done so far.**

 **1\. This spiel is taken almost verbatim from the opening paragraph of the manga.**

 **2\. On TV Tropes, it was explained exactly why 'Motoko Kusanagi' is a blatant alias (as pointed out in the very first chapter of the manga): 'Kusanagi' is the name of a famous sword in Japanese mythology. To give an idea of an equivalent, they said calling someone 'Motoko Kusanagi' is like calling someone in an English-speaking culture 'Jane Excalibur'.**

 **3\. These events are told in the second chapter of the manga,** ** _Super Spartan_** **.**

 **4\. Motoko's hair colour changes throughout the manga, so I decided to go with the colour it always is in** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **.**

 **5\. Besides the sapphic cybersex scene in this chapter, Motoko has a boyfriend later on in the manga, in Chapter 8 (** ** _Dumb Barter_** **), and has had one for seven months. They've even had sex: at one point, while answering a door to a neighbour, Motoko wonders whether she and her boyfriend were too loud the night before…**


	3. Chapter 2: Do You Believe in Magic?

**CHAPTER 2:**

 **DO YOU BELIEVE IN MAGIC?**

Harry was half-expecting to be brought into an interrogation room after his little stunt, or a cell. Instead, after bustling him into the van with the Fuchikomas (with whom he spent much of the drive debating favourite TV series: who knew that the AI tanks were fans of _Red Dwarf?_ ), he was left at Section 9 Headquarters in a lounge, albeit under the suspicious gaze of Togusa (one of the few people who could pull off a mullet and look good rather than ridiculous) and the shifty-eyed gaze of Paz (whom, if Motoko was any indication, was former Yakuza). Motoko, Saito, Batou and Aramaki were all making arrests. Ishikawa and Bouma were currently interrogating the suspects caught during the market shootout, the garbage truck driver and the shooter Harry had disarmed.

Did the Statute of Secrecy still exist in this world? He didn't think he did, as far as he knew. Magic, however, was iffy to prove or disprove. Especially in a world where cyberbrain hacking was a too-frequent occurrence.

Few of the magazines and newspapers had normal print, most of them having barcodes that could be scanned and translated into articles by those with cyberbrains. He didn't know whether the translation charm he had used to help him learn Japanese would help with barcodes, especially as said barcodes would doubtless translate into Japanese rather than English, creating possible problems with a double translation. Plus, getting his wand out while being scrutinised by a couple of possibly jumpy people wouldn't end well by any means. So he resigned himself to reading one of the few non-encoded newspapers.

Some hours later (Harry being allowed to get something to drink and eat from the nearby vending machines), Motoko and Aramaki came back, the former still in her combat suit and body armour. The old man with the simian features and the keen gaze looked at Harry and said, "Mr Potter, if you would kindly come with me. Togusa, you too."

Harry got to his feet, before slouching off after Aramaki and Motoko, Togusa following. Soon, they got to an office that was clearly Aramaki's. While still having some small opulent trappings of command, it was clear that it was more a triumph of function over appearance. Aramaki soon seated himself. Harry had met Aramaki once before when the old man was nosing around. He knew that Aramaki, despite his age, was a formidable man of great intelligence and cunning.

"Mr Potter, it seems that I have you to thank for helping us bring into custody a dangerous perp," Aramaki began. "In addition, you disarmed and paralysed said perp as he was about to fire upon Major Kusanagi. So again, thanks are in order, it seems. However, you seem to have exposed somewhat unusual abilities. You have exposed yourself as an Esper."

Harry blinked. "An Esper?"

"A psychic."

"Um, actually, I'm a wizard. I mean, can an Esper do this?" He pulled out his wand, and then transfigured Aramaki's desk into a horse. Which promptly defecated all over the carpet.

Naturally, the three of them were startled, though Aramaki kept his cool better. After a moment, he said, "Please change it back. I need my desk. I also don't need horse manure on the carpet."

Harry sighed, before changing the horse back into a desk, and then Vanishing the horse manure, using a quick Scourgify to clean the carpet. "Where did the manure go?" Togusa asked.

"A good question, to which I don't know the answer to…" Harry remarked blithely.

* * *

The President of Hanka Precision Instruments was not a happy man. He was up until a few seconds ago, when some horse shit had suddenly dropped out of mid-air and landed on his boxy, Jameson-type cyborg body. He couldn't smell it unless he wanted to (which he didn't), but it was the principle of the thing, as his doctor was currently recoiling from the smell(1)…

* * *

"So you're a mage," Aramaki said.

"And you're taking this very well," Harry observed.

"I have the heads of the Imperial Household Psychic Agency, the Science and Technology Agency's ESP Institute, and the Channelling Agency on speed-dial(2)," Aramaki said. "I have had dealings with them all in the past. To me, a mage is merely a highly advanced Esper."

Harry stared at him, before laughing his head off. "Oh, that's rich! I'd love to hear how those arrogant inbred idiots back home would react to that! They'd probably try to kill you."

"And back home is…where? England?"

"Yeah, England…in a parallel universe," Harry said, knowing that one would provoke disbelief. And this time, it did work. As they stared at him like he was mad, he said, "Oh, and I've become immortal thanks to gathering the three artifacts given by the Grim Reaper herself to a trio of brothers who, with one exception, were retarded. All that inbreeding, you understand."

"…I saw you get injuries that should have been mortal. Are you telling me Death made you immortal?" Motoko asked sceptically.

"Yeah, yeah, I know, hard to believe. Quite frankly, I like it about as much as you believe it, which is to say not much at all. Especially when you survive while your family dies," Harry concluded bitterly. "What you do know is this: I'm an immortal prankster mage. What you want to know is: am I a threat to you? Well, I don't have a cyberbrain, but I can use a nifty little technique to basically look through the memories of a person. You could call it mind-reading as a crude analogy. I can unleash explosions up to a small missile blast or a magical fire that makes the surface of the Sun feel tepid by comparison. A wizard can be a one-man army unto himself."

"And yet, you've kept under the radar, more or less," Aramaki said. "While your lack of a prior identity beyond what you bought is suspicious, your actions have not been criminal or conspicuous. Indeed, if we didn't know any better, we'd have thought you to be not unlike a member of a Public Security Taskforce, or perhaps from the police."

"The Aurors, or the magical police," Harry clarified, thinking, _In for a penny, in for a pound_. "I was, for a time, a Hit Wizard, like the magical equivalent of SWAT. Not quite as disciplined as Section 9 by any means, you're practically a military unit, but we worked along not dissimilar lines."

"So you kept this from us?" Motoko asked. There was nothing truly accusatory in her tone, just a question.

"For a number of reasons. One, I wasn't sure you'd believe me about anything. Two, back home, we had something called the Statute of Secrecy. If we exposed magic to non-mages, we'd be breaking that law. Three, you guys should understand the need for secrecy yourselves. I mean, your own name, Motoko, is some sort of alias. You told me as such. The only reason why you guys know about my magic is that I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and I had a 'saving people thing', as an old friend put it," Harry said.

Aramaki frowned, leaning back, before he said, "Would you object to getting a cyberbrain? Or is there more to this 'medical condition' you cited to Major Kusanagi than merely an excuse?"

"Well, actually, there is. Magic can cause a minor EMP. Anything electronic near a few trained wizards is fine, normally, but medical implants are another matter. A friend of mine got a pacemaker, which fried within a few days. Luckily, he survived that. Of course, you can also use magic to change electronics into something different without messing them up." An impish notion entered his mind, and he couldn't help but smirk.

"Why are you smiling? And why do I feel like running for the hills?" Togusa asked.

"Well, I just had this interesting idea…"

"Please keep it to yourself," Aramaki said.

"No, no, it'll be funny," Harry cackled.

"Perhaps, but we here at Section 9 are engaged in serious business," Aramaki pointed out. "And we're currently considering what to do with you. Frankly, we've been keeping an eye on you to ensure that you were no danger to our operations. Today's incident uncovered disturbing information. So, I have decided, in order to both keep an eye on you and give you an outlet for your skills…"

"To recruit me into Section 9?" Harry asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Technically, you have to be a Japanese citizen, but I have favours that I can call in. I'd like to consider myself a good judge of character, Mr Potter. Please do not disabuse me of that notion. You will be subject to a rigorous screening and interview process prior to being fully recruited, and you will undergo extensive physical, weapons, and stealth training."

"…Does it help if I have a cloak that outdoes just about every thermoptic camouflage currently on the market?" Harry asked.

Aramaki pinched the bridge of his nose. "Of course you have such a thing. But a disadvantage of being in Section 9 without a cyberbrain is being unable to use normal communications channels. We have radios that can tap into cybercommunications, but they cut down on the covert nature of covert communications."

"I can deal with that." Inwardly, Harry was wondering whether he should accept Aramaki's offer. Well, he was thinking about it, but really, he had made the decision some time ago. He was just dithering somewhat. In truth, he needed something more than just working in a library to fill the void in his life. He _wanted_ to make a difference. "Are there any catches?"

"As I said, there will be a rigorous screening and interview process, which I will personally supervise. And while members of Section 9 are given the initiative at many times, you are to follow orders, except under the most extenuating circumstances. And you _will_ be held accountable, mage or not."

"Ah, just like old times," Harry said with a wry smile and a sense of nostalgia.

"We will discuss other matters later. For now, I'm letting you go home with the Major."

* * *

As they left, Harry begged Motoko to let him meet the Fuchikomas. He promised he would do something very funny to them. And Motoko, who had gotten increasingly annoyed by the Fuchikomas demanding natural oil lately (damn Batou showing favouritism to his personal favourite Fuchikoma), decided to agree. She knew that, although this would probably get her into trouble with Aramaki, it would hopefully be funny enough to be worth it.

Batou, that musclebound lump of a joker with the unblinking lenses for eyes, was actually in the Fuchikoma hangar, commiserating to the spider-like tanks (Ron would have been scared of them, Harry reflected) how he didn't get to use his arsenal in the raid on Colonel Malles' residence. He looked up as Motoko and Harry approached. "Hey, Motoko, did you bring your boyfriend to work?"

"Ignore him," Motoko said quietly. "He's got this idea that you're my boyfriend. Not that I'd mind, but…"

"Neither would I," Harry said. He then looked over at Batou. "You wanna see a magic trick? I promise, no disappearing pencils(3)!"

"What?" Batou asked.

Harry, in reply, asked, as he got out his wand, "Which one is your favourite?"

Batou hesitated, wondering if this was a trick. His Fuchikoma, however, was somewhat more gullible, stepping forward and raising one of its forelimbs. In a child-like voice, it said, "I am Mr Batou's favourite!"

Harry grinned, in the manner a shark would upon seeing prey. So too did Motoko. "Well then," Harry said, "this'll be somewhat interesting." He then waved his wand at the Fuchikoma, casting the spell. The Fuchikoma squawked when it was enveloped in a flare of light, and Batou looked on in dismay, even as he shielded his cybernetic eyes from the light.

Then, as the light faded, Motoko and Batou stared at what the Fuchikoma had been turned into. Then, Motoko promptly collapsed to the floor, rolling as she laughed her head off at the sight. Batou, meanwhile, gaped at the Fuchikoma, who was checking over its body. Or rather, her body.

"That's weird, I'm missing a few limbs. I seem to be wearing clothes and sprouting hair. This is NOT in the design specs," the transformed Fuchikoma said with considerable understatement.

"Fuchikoma…" Batou said, in a lost little voice. "Why do you look like Chiyo-chan(4)?"

The Fuchikoma, now looking like a red-headed young girl with twin pigtails, looked up, and cheered. "Mr Batou!" she cried, like a daughter greeting her father, and threw her arms around Batou, hugging him, much to his bemusement, and the amusement of Harry and Motoko, both of whom were laughing their respective arses off. An interesting introduction to Harry Potter joining Section 9…

 **CHAPTER 2 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **And there you have it. Harry joining Section 9, and pranking Batou.**

 **Anyway, while this second chapter is hot on the heels of the first, don't expect any more anytime soon, if only because my muse is, to quote Sander Cohen once more, 'a fickle bitch with a short attention span'. In addition, besides the manga, I intend to adapt episodes from** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **, namely those with little or no connection to the overarching story arc, and which can be adapted to the manga characters. There's a reason for this: time passes between the chapters of the manga (which actually have dates below the chapter title), and there's about three months between the events of Chapter 3 (** ** _Junk Jungle_** **) and Chapter 4 (** ** _Robot Rondo_** **). For the next chapter, there will be an adaptation of a** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **episode, though which one, I don't know. It's a toss-up between 1.1 (** ** _Section 9_** **), 1.8 (** ** _Missing Hearts_** **) or 2.3 (** ** _Cash Eye_** **), my personal favourites from the series.**

 **Review-answering time! I'm astonished at how quickly I got some. Anyway, the only one I'm answering (because they raise some points) is** **Still Not Dead Yet** **. I agree that the whole 'Master of Death' thing has been done to death, which is why I have resisted using it, until now. However, it works as a plot device, as well as to give a certain air of dark comedy (which you can see throughout** ** _Nitimur in Vetitum_** **), and give Harry a certain pathos from being forever young. Harry will be an infiltration and physical (as opposed to cyberspace) espionage specialist, as he has the Cloak of Invisibility, and will be a 'heavy artillery' guy (courtesy of his magic) if things go south. His usefulness when it comes to cyberspace is limited, and while immortal and invincible, he can still be incapacitated by an attack.**

 **1\. The President of Hanka Precision Instruments is the main villain in the** ** _Robot Rondo_** **chapter of the manga. Considering the scheme he has masterminded, getting horse shit dumped on him is far less than he deserves…**

 **2\. The former two organisations are mentioned in Chapter 9 (** ** _Bye Bye Clay_** **), when, while dealing with the Puppeteer (or Puppet Master, as he is called in the movie), Aramaki places calls to both agencies. The Channelling Agency plays a key background role in the story of** ** _Ghost in the Shell 2: Man/Machine Interface_** **, and I hope to bring Tamaki Tamai from that work in.**

 **3\. A reference to the Joker's infamous magic trick in** ** _The Dark Knight_** **.**

 **4\. Chiyo-chan, for those not in the know, is a cheerful and precocious girl from the series** ** _Azumanga Daioh_** **. When I was thinking of a human form for a Fuchikoma, given that the Fuchikomas seem very like the Tachikomas in** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **, I had the Tachikoma's voices in my head while writing this chapter. And I thought for some reason that, if they were ever turned into humans, they'd be like Chiyo-chan on red cordial. They're basically like very intelligent but very naïve children. Assume that** ** _Azumanga Daioh_** **exists in the universe of** ** _Ghost in the Shell_** **.**


	4. Chapter 3: First Case

**CHAPTER 3:**

 **FIRST CASE**

Harry was perched on top of his broomstick, Invisibility Cloak over him, carefully flying over the rooftops. It was going to be his first actual work for Section 9, being part of an operation involving the entirety of the operatives. As it was, he was on lookout duty, keeping an eye out for the perp when Motoko traced him or her.

A geisha club, staffed by geisha gynoids, was under siege. Said gynoids, presumably under the control of some hacker, had taken a number of VIPs hostage, including the Minister of Foreign Affairs, his secretary, the chief of the Ministry Support Association, as well as two representatives from the North American Industrial Promotion Alliance. For some reason, an old colleague of Aramaki's, a Military Intelligence officer by the name of Kobuta, was trying to get the cops to hand over operational command. Thankfully, Aramaki had enough pull with both factions that he could potentially get the operation handed over to Section 9, with their success in dealing with Colonel Malles helping bring them to the fore.

Over his headset, which he had put special silencing charms so nobody but him could hear him speak into it when he used it, he asked Motoko, "Has the old ape gotten them to finish their jurisdictional pissing contest yet?"

" _Not yet_ ," Motoko said, her voice having the distinct flanging noise of a cybercomms. " _How're you doing up there?_ "

"It's cold outside, there's no kind of atmosphere, and I'm all alone, more or less," Harry quoted in English rather than Japanese. Motoko knew enough English (she spoke the language fluently), as well as her roommate's viewing habits, to know it was a quote from the theme song from _Red Dwarf_. In Japanese, he said, "I haven't spotted any suspicious-acting arseholes on the rooftops yet, but give it time. I've got that Sat-Nav on my phone set up to show where your tracer virus pinpoints." He frowned when he saw someone crouched on a rooftop below, half-hidden by a large neon light sign, connected to some sort of electronic apparatus. "Wait, scratch that. I see a possible perp on the roof. Sending you coordinates and a photo." He took out his smartphone, and took a picture. "Well? What do I do?"

" _Wait to see how he reacts to when we storm the place, as well as the tracer virus. Acting now might have him trigger some sort of fail-deadly on the geisha gynoids, killing the hostages. Assuming it's him we're looking for. Nice photo of his setup. And that setup does seem to show he's the guy we're after. I'll let you know when the operation begins, and when I unleash the tracer virus._ "

"Right. I'll use a Body-Bind, and then Legilimency, once I confirm it's him. Harry out."

As he settled his broomstick to halt above the possible perp, Harry reflected that it was good that Motoko hadn't truly taken offence to him keeping secrets. He honestly couldn't blame them for being suspicious and curious about him. Aramaki had ordered Harry to begin switching residences along with Motoko, once Aramaki had cleared him for duty.

Aramaki had many of the more manipulative traits of Dumbledore, but Harry also knew that Aramaki was also more pragmatic than his old mentor. Aramaki was less optimistic than Dumbledore, and would be willing to kill if necessary, but he also had his heart firmly in the right place. And given the corruption in high places in Japan, Aramaki was a relative anomaly, trying to help clean up the system from within, as well as helping others. Ironically, he played dirty to clean things up.

Harry was shaken out of his reverie by Motoko beginning to make a roll call of the members of Section 9 on a general broadcast. " _Harry, you ready?_ " she called out after calling off the others.

"Ready and waiting," Harry murmured. "Just let me know when you've sent the tracer virus. Hopefully, you won't need Paz and Bouma to get them."

Soon, after some banter (with Batou joking about whether the geisha gynoids were on strike and demanding a payrise), Aramaki ordered the mission to begin. A couple of minutes later, Motoko called, just as Harry saw the man convulse and rip some cables from cyberbrain ports on his neck, " _Harry, I've sent it. Is it him?_ "

Harry cast a Body-Bind, and checked the Sat-Nav on his phone as the perp collapsed. "Yeah, it's him. I've paralysed him, he ain't going…" Suddenly, the man spasmed briefly, sparks appearing from the back of his neck. He then went still. "Shit!" Harry hissed, bringing the broomstick down and checking the man. In the lower cyberbrain ports, a strange device was sparking. The man had a pulse and was breathing, but was unconscious.

" _Harry? What's wrong?_ "

"Major, the perp had some sort of device on the back of his neck." He took a photo, and sent it to Motoko. "What the hell is that?"

An impressive array of expletives in Japanese and English echoed up the line. Eventually, Motoko said, " _That's a boobytrap. He's burnt out his own memory. I don't think he's going to be telling us anything any time soon_ …"

* * *

Legilimency proved fruitless. The man's memory for the past several months had been wiped. One of the NAIPA officials had been killed, apparently, while the secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs was in a critical condition, and currently in hospital. Said secretary was also one of Kobuta's agents from Military Intelligence. Still, not a complete balls-up, as the NAIPA official had been killed before Section 9 stormed the place, and the secretary did have a good chance of recovery as they had gotten to her in time.

They left the perp (who, once he had regained consciousness, was surprisingly calm and serene) in an interrogation room, while Harry and Motoko went to Aramaki's office, where Kobuta, a man with glasses and a neat beard and a neater suit, was waiting. He seemed surprised to see Harry there, but Aramaki vouched for Harry, and this was apparently good enough for Kobuta.

When prompted by Aramaki, Kobuta said, "As I told you before, the secretary of the Minister was one of my people. We were conducting an investigation into the Minister. His recent activities showed an interest in the Ichinose Report."

It seemed to be a relatively secret report (about diplomatic and strategic scenarios during states of emergency), albeit one that the Minister could have access to if he made a disclosure request. As he hadn't to date, Kobuta was taking a wait and see approach. No anomalous financial or personal activities had been uncovered, so the Minister was clean, to at least some degree.

"I could use Legilimency, you know," Harry muttered to Motoko.

"Sorry?" Kobuta asked.

"Operative Potter is the mage I told you about. He has an ability to Ghost Hack without using cybernetics," Aramaki said. "He can view the memories of someone with ease, even if they're using a cyberbrain. However, he only uses it in warranted circumstances."

"It's perhaps best that you don't do so in this case anyway," Kobuta said, peering at Harry over his glasses. "A mage with the ability to discern the dirty secrets of the government would be feared. I will keep that ability secret, but I suggest that you don't use it on officials unless there is no other option. Otherwise, you will find people gunning for you and Section 9."

"Even so, Kobuta, it might be that your agent, the one posing as the secretary, may have discovered something and had been attacked to cover it up," Motoko pointed out.

As surprise and realisation bloomed across Kobuta's face, and he put his face in his hands, Aramaki said, gently, "You dropped the ball. That isn't like you."

Harry actually felt sorry for the man. It was clear that he cared somewhat for his agents. "I know, I blew it this time," Kobuta murmured.

"Then allow us to investigate, as a favour to you. Does that sound reasonable?" Aramaki asked.

"I'd be grateful. But don't do anything to jeopardise your own career, Aramaki," Kobuta said. As he stood, he said, "I'll contact you if there's anything new."

After Kobuta left, saying his goodbyes, Aramaki looked at Motoko and Harry. "Look into the Minister's conduct again. Find anything, any little thing that might help, no matter how innocuous. And try to find out exactly what happened in the restaurant. I'm going to ask some contacts of mine about the Ichinose Report, try to uncover why the Minister might have been interested in this."

"Wasn't Kobuta a good friend of yours?" Motoko asked wryly.

"Still is," Aramaki said. "That's why I'm doing this for him."

"To help him weather the shitstorm from his operative being nearly killed, right?" Harry sighed. "Is she going to be alright?"

"Still touch and go, though she has a good chance of making it," Aramaki said. "You have your orders."

* * *

They went down to fetch Togusa, who had gone to the shooting range. Motoko gently berated him for being worried about missing his target in a hostage situation. Harry knew that Motoko, for all of her treating him like a greenhorn, actually liked Togusa, and Harry did too. He also didn't share Motoko's disdain for Togusa's habitual usage of a Mateba revolver.

Motoko clearly valued Togusa's investigative skills, and Harry and Togusa went back to the geisha club, while Motoko did some digging into the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Harry got the feeling that while Kobuta's investigation had marked him as 'clean', the Minister had something going on.

As they reached the restaurant once more (though Harry hadn't been in it, Togusa had), Motoko had sent them over surveillance footage, whatever hadn't been blacked out during the attack. Already, the three of them were realising something was wrong. The footage showed the Minister heading into the male toilets with one of the geisha gynoids. Oddly enough, he loved to swap bodies with gynoids, especially when drunk, Motoko found out. Then, one of the NAIPA officials entered the toilet, holding a metal briefcase. The secretary went to the toilet door and peeked in some time afterwards, only to back away. In fact, the last bit of footage before it dissolved into static for a few minutes was of one of the geisha gynoids lunging at her from behind.

In addition, the murdered NAIPA official, the one who had entered the toilet, had his cyberbrain half out, but the components didn't match those of the cyberbrain unit he was supposed to have. The surviving NAIPA official claimed that he heard his colleague being attacked first, before the secretary, but the footage didn't match up. The Chief of the Ministry Support Association was mostly inebriated, but he did claim that the secretary was attacked first.

All of which suggested that the NAIPA survivor was either an unreliable witness, or a liar.

Motoko had gone to meet Aramaki with the footage in question. Meanwhile, Togusa and Harry were currently standing in the toilet, with Harry replaying the footage on his smartphone. "Togusa," Harry murmured, "why do I get the feeling that briefcase has something to do with it?"

Togusa frowned. "The Minister seemed to go for it pretty quickly. He thanked me, went over to where it was left with the dead NAIPA official, and picked it up." He looked over at the screen, and looked at where Harry had paused the video, just as the deceased NAIPA official entered.

"That's it," Togusa muttered. "That briefcase…it'd be big enough for a cyberbrain and life-support. The NAIPA official, or at least someone masquerading as him, wanted to masquerade as the Minister. Because it's public knowledge about him bodyswapping with gynoid geishas…"

Harry's eyes widened. "Someone's going to use his identity to get a copy of the Ichinose Report!" He dialled up Motoko on his smartphone, while Togusa used his cybercomms.

* * *

As it turned out, the Minister had requested a copy of the report from Kobuta, who had given him an encrypted copy that couldn't be copied normally to buy time. Sadly, he had left, in the company of the NAIPA officials, and was heading to the airport to catch a flight to America, in order to give a speech at a party sponsored by the NAIPA.

Harry and Togusa were picked up by Aramaki and Motoko, while Batou and Saito were mobilising from Section 9 HQ. Harry and Togusa flanked Aramaki when they finally arrived at the airport, Aramaki having called in a favour to have the flight 'delayed' due to bad weather.

Harry kept his hands in his pockets, one of them on his wand, as he watched Aramaki deliver a letter that stood the Minister down from his position, for medical reasons. As the faux-Minister lost his temper, Harry whipped out his wand and used a Body-Bind on the man's bodyguards. The impostor was astonished, though even more so when he saw red dots from targeting lasers on his body.

As Togusa took the briefcase from the impostor, Harry went over to the Minister's bodyguards. "Sorry about that," he said. "But this is actually an impostor who has swapped his cyberbrain with the Minister." He then removed the Body-Bind, showing them the cyberbrain Togusa was examining within the briefcase…and that wonderful 'Oh Crap' expression on the impostor's face.

Aramaki asked, "Care to tell me who you really are? We'll find out eventually, especially if we have Potter here use his skills."

Harry gave the faux-Minister a shark-like grin. And he knew that the impostor had just wet himself a little.

* * *

That night, at their shared apartment, Harry looked at Motoko as she emerged from the shower, towelling herself off. "So Kobuta's agent's alive?"

Motoko nodded. "She needs extensive cyberbrain enhancement, and she'll have some trouble with her speech centres, but it'll work out. Kobuta and his agents' parents were grateful. We're lucky Kobuta got into his little jurisdictional pissing contest with the cops, and then we got involved. Otherwise, the police would have stormed the place, destroyed the geishas, and probably not noticed what had happened until it was too late. And we'd be seeing the Minister's defection all over the news tonight."

"I'm amazed at how much pull Aramaki had, to delay that plane and to get that letter," Harry muttered.

"Old Ape-Face follows the motto of your Boy Scouts: be prepared."

Harry chuckled a little. He then gazed at the naked body of Motoko. She was the epitome of perfection in that cyborg body of hers. He felt rather scrawny by comparison. But shortly before this mission, she had asked whether he wanted to become a lover. They were already friends, and had become comrades. He accepted, because she became less guarded around him, especially now that he had admitted the full truth about himself, even if much of it was insane.

Ginny and the kids still haunted him. But he would have liked to have thought that they would have wanted him to be happy. And now that he was doing something to clean up this new world he was in, he felt like he could risk himself in trying again for happiness in the arms of another.

They embraced, their lips locking. Harry reflected that whoever made Motoko's body was a master, because her mouth tasted exactly like a human's. Of course, that wasn't all about her body that was exactly like a human's, as he would discover as the night went on…

 **CHAPTER 3 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **This chapter was mostly adapted from the first episode of** ** _Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex_** **. Well, save for the bit at the end. The next chapter (or chapters) will be mostly based on** ** _Robot Rondo_** **, the fourth chapter of the manga.**

 **Review-answering time!** **TJG** **: They're probably not far off from having Ghosts. Batou, Harry, and Motoko will have more of a discussion about this in the next few chapters, while discussing the rogue robots as well.**

 **Celestia's Paladin** **: He's the first two. Immortality and having his family murdered helped that. Keep in mind that the Motoko Kusanagi from the manga was a humorous sort, though: she'd often raz Aramaki.**

 **No numbered annotations this time…**


	5. Chapter 4: Yet Another Robot Rebellion

**CHAPTER 4:**

 **YET ANOTHER ROBOT REBELLION**

"You mean to tell me," Motoko said, as she looked at the Fuchikomas, now transformed into young anime characters and dancing around Batou, "that the Fuchikomas have Ghosts?"

"If by that you mean souls, I'd say yes," Harry said. "You can transfigure a soulless thing so that it has the semblance of life and all, but what I used was more like an Animagus spell, only instead of turning a human into an animal, it turned a machine into a human. They still have a somewhat different psychology to humans in that they're, well, child soldiers, but are used to that. I turned Batou's favourite into Chiyo-chan, yours has become a more intelligent young Son Goku, and so on."

"And your point is?"

"Treat them as partners rather than tools, and I don't think you'll have to worry about a robot revolt," Harry said. "It's not a surefire way, but transforming them into kids actually helps them, because they're actually curious about what being human is like. And they like Batou, of course."

"Because he spoils his, gives… _her_ natural oil," Motoko said, holding herself back from saying 'it' about the Fuchikoma Batou favoured. Harry could understand her reasoning to a degree: the Fuchikoma were weapons of war, and needed to be able to act as such.

"Well, look at it this way, his being nice to her helps you all." Harry tapped his wand against his palm. "Hell, I could even give you a wholly organic body, temporarily, if you'd like."

"Maybe later, in the bedroom," Motoko said with a smirk. "I'd like to compare the sensations. Though I think in many respects, a prosthetic body is better."

"You're saying that because you can do your superhero thing. All you need to do is wear a leotard and a cape."

"And I'm used to that. I mean, I've had a cyborg body since I was a kid. I can't really remember what it's like to have an organic body, or even if it'd be much different from a cyborg one."

It was at this point that Aramaki entered, looking harassed and harried. "Harry, turn the Fuchikomas back to normal. We have an assignment coming up, and I need them on standby in case they need to be used."

Harry sighed, before calling to the Fuchikomas. "Okay, kids, playtime's over. You know the pre-reversion drill."

There was a chorus of disappointed noises from the Fuchikomas, who nonetheless obeyed, moving to their assigned spots, so that when they regained their normal shape and size, they wouldn't hit each other or the humans, or the walls or equipment. Harry then changed them back to their tank forms. He then turned to Aramaki. "So, what's up?"

"Section 9 is being brought in on the 'berserk droids' investigation, focusing specifically on the Tomliand gynoids produced by Hanka Precision Instruments. I'm assigning you three, along with Togusa, to track down the latest berserk gynoid. Ishikawa is already at the Shinhama Police Station, seeing if he can find a cause for the Tomliand droids going berserk, along with other droids."

* * *

This time, Harry was paired up with Togusa. Togusa and Harry had warmed to each other significantly, especially after their joint work on that saga involving the Minister for Foreign Affairs. He'd even been to Togusa's house, and met his wife and daughter.

"So, what's the game plan?" Togusa asked as they checked a narrow alleyway.

"We find the gynoid, I use a Body-Bind on it," Harry said. "Stay alert just in case. If it sees the spell coming, it might dodge it. I might need you to disable it."

"Sure. I read up on the Tomliand cases. Supposedly, this is the eighth gynoid to go berserk from that line."

"Eight, huh?" Harry frowned. "What's that saying? Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, but the third time…" Suddenly, there was a discordant electronic scream, and a gynoid leapt out at them, its features distorted in a feral snarl. Harry managed to cast the Body-Bind, but momentum caused the now-petrified gynoid to crash into him, sending him into a pile of rubbish bags.

"…Is enemy action?" Togusa asked.

"Just get it off me," Harry muttered. "I think it cracked a rib when it fell on me."

* * *

As Harry and Togusa carried the gynoid to the waiting car, Harry found himself looking at the gynoid's eyes. He was disturbed to note that they were flickering back in forth in agitation, not just in anger, but anxiety. And that disturbed him. Because the gynoid was exhibiting very human-like behaviour.

As they got to the car, and the Tomliand gynoid was put into a cage, Harry, on a whim, pulled out his wand. "Something's wrong about this gynoid," Harry muttered. "Beyond it going berserker."

"What do you mean?"

"Look at its eyes. That looks altogether too human for me, like it has a soul."

"It's just sophisticated software," Togusa said with a shrug. "It's nowhere near the level of the Fuchikomas."

"I wonder…" Harry said. Eventually, he told Togusa, "Contact the Major and Batou. Tell them we have the Tomliand. I'm doing Legilimency."

"On a gynoid?"

"If it works, then my theory is correct. Legilimency only works on something that's sentient." Harry pointed the wand at the gynoid, and said quietly, "I'm sorry. _Legilimens_."

* * *

In a series of images, an entire life flashed before his eyes. Not the short life of a gynoid, but of a longer, though still short, life. A hard childhood in the Philippines, followed by being abducted by human traffickers, part of a criminal gang that operated partly in Japan. The indoctrination and training at a factory. The drugs. And then, being hooked up brutally to life-support, tubes invading the body, while the life and soul of her was torn from her body…

And then, there she was, a Filipino girl in her early teens, standing in front of Harry in the middle of a white void. He realised she was dressed in the same clothes as the Tomliand gynoid, thankfully fairly modest ones. "Who're you?!" she demanded. "Why're you here?"

"Sorry, I'm with Public Security Section 9. Like the police? I'm Harry." Harry looked at her. "…Are you the gynoid?"

"That's what they turned me into, tearing the soul out of my body and putting it into this thing, chaining my mind and soul so that…" The girl shuddered. "They called it 'ghost-dubbing'."

Harry paled. When he joined Section 9, he had been given a crash-course in various things about cybernetics, robotics technology, and other areas of research. Ghost-dubbing was effectively copying the 'ghost' or soul of a human onto an electronic medium. The invasive technology needed, however, killed the person inevitably. "Do you have a name?"

"They got rid of my old name when they took me to Japan. They called me Rachael Rosen(1)."

"Well, Rachael, I can't let you go on the rampage. Listen, if you can stay calm while we take you back to Section 9, we will take a statement from you. I mean, are you able to speak through the gynoid?"

She shook her head. "They have programs stopping us. We had to put in programs of our own, to cause us to go berserk."

"Shit. Well, I'll do what I can, okay? But we have to take you away from here. Don't worry, we'll try to get you, well, as back to normal as you can. Okay?"

Rachael didn't look convinced, but she nodded reluctantly.

* * *

As Harry withdrew, he found Togusa being chewed out by Batou. "…donkey work onto my superiors, I'd…oh, you're back with us, Harry. Find anything interesting?"

"Horrifying is more like it." Harry jerked his head at the Tomliand gynoid. "Her mind's not a happy place, and it's not hard to see why."

"Wait, did you say 'her'?" Togusa asked, with a frown.

"Yeah. _She_ has a _ghost_. More to the point, a human ghost, dubbed onto a gynoid."

Batou, Motoko, and Togusa gaped at him, before they decided to deal with it later. Squeezing into the car, they got ready to go. "Togusa, send the documents back to HQ," Motoko said. "Harry, while we're en route to Ishikawa, you can tell us what the hell you meant…"

* * *

Batou, by the end of Harry's explanation, muttered, "I think I'm gonna be sick."

"You're telling me," Harry muttered. "Smuggling girls in, ripping their souls out and turning them into glorified sex droids…unfortunately, whoever made these put in control programs that prevent them from going outside certain parameters. And presumably those programs were too hardwired to do more than make a different program to make them berserk under certain circumstances."

"We'll have to investigate Hanka Precision Instruments soon," Motoko decided. "If this really is the case…"

"So, why is Section 9 on the case anyway, aside from what we've just found out?" Harry said, jerking his thumb at the gynoid.

"Aramaki hasn't told me the full details, but apparently certain Tomliand units are owned by some VIPs. I wouldn't be surprised if one of them was an old friend of his," Motoko said.

* * *

After a meeting with Ishikawa, who had some interesting theories about why robots in general went berserk, and their dropping off Rachael (as Harry began to call the gynoid) back at Section 9 HQ, Motoko went to go with Aramaki. As it turned out, Aramaki was investigating partly because a Tomliand gynoid had gone berserk and tried to murder one Colonel Tonoda, a mentor who was something of a robot fetishist. Motoko gave Harry a feed from her eyes to his smartphone for the meeting, and he chuckled as the rotund Tonoda unwittingly insulted Motoko, all but saying he thought her to be a gynoid. Whereupon Motoko gave Tonoda the finger. Tonoda panicked when he learned that the special protection was being withdrawn.

Aramaki then told Motoko, and the others via connection, that Section 9 was still on the case. Besides Harry's Legilimency, which wasn't exactly admissible evidence, there was an 'SOS' written in blood on the brain case of seven Tomliand prototypes they had found. While Motoko were going to do some electronic investigation (Aramaki, along with Ishikawa, Bouma and Paz, were helping guard a conference, and Saito was in Phnom Penh, Cambodia), Harry, Batou, and Togusa were to head to Hanka Precision Instruments. Batou's Fuchikoma was to come along as backup.

Their main objective for the moment was to find and interrogate the shipping inspector responsible for that particular prototype gynoid. And as they pulled up, they found someone shuffling out of the factory complex gate, his eyes wide.

Batou frowned. "Look at his badge. Says 'Kubonuma: Shipping Inspector'. Maybe that's our guy."

Togusa snorted. "He doesn't look like he could even inspect his own dick now."

Harry scowled. "Something's not right here. Is it me, or is he drugged?"

Togusa shrugged, before pulling out his ID and showing it to Kubonuma. "Excuse me sir, but I would like to ask you a few questions."

The man suddenly looked up, and his eyes widened. Suddenly, a hole dug itself into the front of his head, and the back of his head exploded in a gory spray.

"TAKE COVER!" Batou yelled, and the three investigators took cover behind the walls of the factory. Bullets smacked into the wall, though Harry noted that the shooter must have been using some kind of silencer.

Togusa returned fire. "Harry, if you've got anything in your bag of tricks, now would be a great time to use it!"

Harry nodded, before whipping out his Invisibility Cloak and the broomstick, keeping it in a bag with an Expansion Charm. He mounted the broomstick, and then whipped the Cloak around him. "Keep him busy," he hissed. "I'll try and get the drop on him."

Harry rose into the air, and flew for the building. The shooter, a burly thug of a man with a shaved head and a moustache, wasn't hiding that much, save for using the edge of the rooftop. Once Harry had a bead on him, he waved his wand, and yelled, "EXPELLIARMUS!"

The gun was torn from the man's hands, and as he stared, Harry cast another Body-Bind. With an undignified squawk, he toppled over. Harry picked the man up with difficulty, and then lowered him down to the ground, where Togusa and Batou were waiting.

Batou had Harry undo the Body-Bind, before he glared at the shooter. "Why'd you kill the inspector?"

"I not talk to you, pig!"

Batou scowled. "Really? You may have grown that moustache to hide the scars, but I know that handiwork anywhere. You were a POW in either Khorassan or Baluchistan. You were tortured by 'the Dentist', weren't you?" Batou pulled out a knife, and stalked towards the man.

"No! You not do this! I call my lawyer!"

"You won't have the chance, asshole," Batou said. Harry winced, hoping Batou would take it to the wire, but not beyond it.

"AHHH! ALL RIGHT, I TALK!" the shooter yelled, unable to call Batou's bluff.

He confessed in a babble that seemed to vomit from his mouth. His boss, a gang member, was attacked by a Tomliand gynoid, and the man was from that very gang that did the human trafficking. The inspector he killed was apparently the man responsible for the prototype Tomlis.

Harry, after the shooter had finished, used a Morpheus charm and a Body-Bind. He then looked to the factory. "I guess we've got to check things out…"

* * *

Batou's Fuchikoma soon arrived, and helped them hack their way through the factory door's security. As they rushed in, Harry, Batou, and Togusa kept their eyes peeled. They soon spotted a woman dragging two Filipino girls. "…Being so difficult, Adam and Link!" the woman snarled. "You're in deep trouble! The boss is waiting, so…" She happened to spot the three investigators.

Togusa leapt down. A brief fight ensued, but Togusa managed to knock the woman down unconscious. "Sorry, but perps need to be taken down, even if they are women," Togusa said to her.

Batou and Harry, meanwhile, pursued the two Filipino girls. They soon found themselves in a room that looked nightmarishly familiar to Harry, though this time, he was seeing it in reality. Encased in special devices were gynoids, while at the far end, encased in ghost-dubbing equipment, grotesque lenses stuck into her eye sockets, wires and cables implanted into her skull, and intubated, was a girl.

"Son of a bitch," Batou muttered. "Looks like you were right after all, Harry. This shit's ghost-dubbing equipment. They're murdering the girls they smuggle in, all to make their gynoids more life-like."

Suddenly, the two Filipino girls emerged from hiding. "Are you with the police?" one of them asked.

"Public Security Section 9," Batou said. "Who're you?"

"I'm Link, and this is Adam," one of the girls said.

"They called a girl 'Adam'?" Harry remarked.

"Adam Link is the name of a robot from an old science fiction novel," Batou explained. "Like Rachael. They must've been given codenames or something."

"We're Stage 4," Link explained. "Gosseyn's already at Stage 5, and, well, she's there. She's being copied and wiped. It's too late for her."

"So you're the ones who caused the gynoids to go berserk? And had those SOSes written?" Harry asked.

Link nodded eagerly. "Yes! How'd you know?" She looked at Adam. "It's like Gosseyn told us! Now we won't have to be copied and wiped!"

"So, how many of you were involved?" Batou asked.

"Gosseyn and that inspector Kubonuma set it up," Adam said.

Batou scowled. "And did you ever think about what you did?" When they looked at him, startled, he said, "Two people have died because of the Tomlis going berserk, three if you count that inspector! A dozen were wounded, and that's not counting the misdemeanours! And you two are responsible for that!"

"Batou," Harry said with a scowl. "What would you have done in their place? They were trying to get help."

Batou wheeled on Harry, before his face fell. "Dammit. But even so…"

"Look, the people here started doing bad things to us first!" Adam protested. But before she could continue, the Fuchikoma arrived.

"Mr Batou, Mr Togusa and I have arrested twenty engineers. However, the President of Hanka Precision Instruments and his personal doctor are missing. He sent me in here because we couldn't raise you on cybercomms."

"Shit," Batou swore. "This room is a Faraday Cage. It cuts down on EM interference, probably helps with the ghost-dubbing."

"Mr Togusa told me to tell you he spotted the President fleeing in a car."

"Damn! Harry, help the Fuchikoma bring them to transportation! They're material witnesses at least! I've got to catch that bastard!"

As he fled, Harry looked at Adam and Link. "Sorry, kids," he said with a sigh. "Look, I understand why you did what you did, but people have died, beyond those who deserved it, as well as your friends. Don't worry. Given what these scumbags did, they'll view this as 'extenuating circumstances'." _I hope_ , he added mentally.

"The scary guy with the camera-eyes, he said Rachael," Link said. "How did you know one of our friends was Rachael?"

"…Long story. She's waiting back at Section 9. C'mon. At least there you won't be sacrificed to make gynoids…"

* * *

Harry was sickened to hear that Colonel Tonoda was very complicit in the crimes of Hanka Precision Instruments. Tonoda had actually sold an old intelligence agency facility to Hanka, and had been on the committee overseeing the company. He had been paid a lot of hush money to help Hanka set up their grotesque installation.

Harry was a bit more amused to learn that, in his haste to try and get onto a yacht to get to safety, the President of Hanka ended up falling into the water, and had to be dredged out. He would later learn that the President had, when Harry had first joined Section 9, been the unwitting recipient of the horse shit he had vanished. It couldn't have gone to a more deserving man.

As for the children, well, it was a mess and a half to clean up. The Tomliand prototypes were recalled (the few surviving ones), and Harry decided to try what he did with the Fuchikomas, hoping that the transfiguration would help.

To his surprise, and that of everyone else, it did. True, he needed to figure out how to use runes to keep the girls from reverting back to gynoids, and it did only so much to help with the psychological issues of being turned into gynoids…but it was better than nothing. The surviving children and gynoids would have to go through a lengthy process of rehabilitation, and Adam, Link, and the gynoid Gosseyn was funnelled into, would have their day in court. But because of their circumstances, they were put on probation, and adopted out. The publicity about the case actually helped them get adopted. While it wasn't exactly a flawless victory, it was better than nothing.

And Harry and Motoko took four days of paid vacation time. Frankly, after a case like this, which dived deep into the depravities of humanity, they needed it. Batou, when he joked about Harry and Motoko having 'passionate leave', got a fist to the eye for his troubles. But he wasn't wrong…

 **CHAPTER 4 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **This chapter was based on Chapter 6 of the original manga,** ** _Robot Rondo_** **, which was also used as the basis for the movie** ** _Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence_** **. The next chapter will probably be based on a** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **episode, probably** ** _Cash Eye_** **, which has similar themes to** ** _Robot Rondo_** **, and could be a follow-up investigation in this story.**

 **I thought that the consequences of Harry's magic might make an interesting impact on the story, so while the outcome isn't that much different to the manga story, there's a slightly happier ending, in that the girls turned into gynoids can live again.**

 **Review-answering time!** **Jostanos** **: *groan***

 **Heika** **: True, but if word gets out that Harry can look into people's minds and bypassing any cyberbrain barriers in the process, he might get poached from Section 9 or else killed. Kobuta is only cautioning Harry because he trusts Aramaki's judgement of Harry.**

 **Guest** **: Try translating something twice, say, first from Japanese to German, and then from German to English. The result is going to be mangled, especially with something like Google Translate or Babelfish. Harry can't translate the barcodes in the first place anyway, as he hasn't got a cyberbrain. Once he got the smartphone mentioned in the previous chapter, however, he can read the Japanese text when he uses an app on the smartphone.**

 **diagonalpumpkin** **: I would think that Harry is more tech-savvy than most wizards (though given that they are stuck in Victorian times at best, this isn't difficult), and he could pick up the basics of most technology. And there's a lovely speech in the original** ** _Ghost in the Shell_** **movie where Motoko talks to Togusa about why they recruited him (a police officer) into Section 9, an organisation dominated by ex-military and special forces types. She points out that they need a heterogeneous mixture of operatives to work best, or else they will be too predictable and vulnerable. Harry helps supplement this, with his magic enhancing this.**

 **grievergf** **: Thanks for your kind words. Having read the manga, watched the two Mamoru Oshii movies and a good chunk of** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **, I think I know how to write a** ** _Ghost in the Shell_** **fanfic competently. I chose to base it more on the manga (particularly in terms of characterisation) because I find a more comic Motoko to be easier (and more fun) to write. However, no elements of** ** _Arise_** **are going to be put into this, if only because I haven't watched it, nor do I have any intention of doing so.**

 **1\. In the manga, three of the girls Hanka were using were called Adam and Link and Gosseyn. Adam Link, as Batou mentions, is the name of a robot from a series by Eando Binder, while Gosseyn comes from the** ** _Null-A_** **series by A.E van Vogt. In tribute to that, the gynoid Harry and Togusa capture had been ghost-dubbed from a girl called Rachael Rosen, named for one of the Replicant characters from** ** _Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?_** **by Philip K Dick. For those of you not in the know, that novel was adapted into** ** _Blade Runner_** **, probably a big influence on Masamune Shirow when he did** ** _Ghost in the Shell_** **, and certainly an influence on the makers of the films and TV series.**


	6. Chapter 5: Cash Eye and the Phantom

**CHAPTER 5:**

 **CASH EYE AND THE PHANTOM**

Aramaki clearly didn't like Chairman Tadokoro, and Harry already began to share that belief, along with Motoko. The only consolation was that they were engaged in a major operation to basically stick it to this corporate fat cat. He wasn't that fat, especially compared to the obese Tonoda, but his manner was so oleaginous and sleazy, Harry was perpetually tempted to use an Incendio on the man and see how brightly he burned. Aramaki was making out that his superiors, including the Prime Minister, had badgered him into investigating, giving just the faintest hint of bad grace. Not that Aramaki was actually lying, but it wasn't the whole truth.

Harry wondered idly how Tadokoro would react if he learned that the very thieves who had broken into his headquarters last night, leaving only a pair of business cards, were Motoko and himself. Motoko had worn a skintight white suit and a special visor that concealed most of the face, while Harry had worn a similar suit and visor, using the Invisibility Cloak to remain invisible most of the time, and his broomstick to stay off the pressure alarm-ridden floors. Motoko looked so good in that skintight suit that after they had escaped from the building, triggering an alarm deliberately after leaving the business cards, they headed straight back home, more or less, for some quality time, pausing only to send an electronic report to Aramaki.

While the operation seemed somewhat convoluted to Harry, it appealed to his Marauder sensibility. The plan was this: fabricate the reputations of two thieves Motoko and Harry would be playing the roles of, namely Cash Eye and the Phantom, respectively; target Tadokoro's business, which was due to host a shindig where the movers and shakers would be showing off their sex gynoids; get asked to provide security to said shindig to prevent the robbery of Cash Eye and the Phantom; perpetrate said robbery to fake Tadokoro out and get him to give Section 9 access to the vault. Apparently Tadokoro had been laundering money for not just Hanka Precision Instruments (he had nearly become a victim of one of the prototype Tomliands), but a number of people. They just needed proof, checking the serial numbers on the cash he had in the vault. So, it was basically going to be a massive prank played on a rich arsehole.

They had basically sent him a warning, posing as hackers who stole e-money, with Tadokoro storing his assets in physical form in the vault afterwards. Last night was just a warning shot, to tell him 'physical defences don't matter either'. So far, Tadokoro thought the thieves to have sent a couple of droids as their proxies.

Aramaki sighed. "This does fall somewhat outside of our realm of expertise. You may have lost faith in the local police, but they have more resources than us, and are more suited to this sort of crime. Section 9 is specialised, after all." He was playing the role of someone badgered into doing this very well.

Tadokoro looked at the three of them. "Out of the question. I'm sorry, but tomorrow night, which is when Cash Eye and the Phantom intend to make their move, there's going to be a party here, held by the major players in finance and economics. While not actually illicit, it's a gathering of those with similar interests that the uncultured or unsophisticated may look askance upon, especially after that fiasco with Hanka Precision Instruments. But due to the nature of this gathering, it would be impossible to change the time or venue. National policies are frequently discussed, even set at functions like these. That's why I need a man able to understand the sensitive situation. I also want to make up for the Hanka fiasco. That's why I need someone to help with the security shake-up."

 _Sure you do_ , Harry thought, struggling not to roll his eyes. He knew Motoko and Aramaki were having the same trouble.

Eventually, Aramaki said, "My superiors made it clear I can't decline."

"Aramaki, there's no need to sound so sour," Tadokoro said. "The Prime Minister recommended your team, and I can see why." He looked over at Motoko, managing to keep a leer off his face, but not from his eyes. "I can almost smell her white blood from here."

"Major Kusanagi is not a gynoid," Harry said. "You're the second person in about as many weeks to make that mistake."

"My apologies," Tadokoro said with an insincere smile. "It's just that multipurpose prosthetic bodies really fan the flames of my libido. I have a thing for artificial bodies, you understand, cyborgs or gynoids."

* * *

On the car-ride back, Harry shuddered. "Okay, it's one thing to have a fetish or something for gynoids and cyborgs. That's fine. But is it just me, or does that guy make you want to go scrub yourself in hydrochloric acid?"

"It's not just you," Motoko scowled. "I'm not looking forward to tomorrow night, I must say."

"I know, and I'm sorry, but it's going to get worse from here. There'll be a lot fraying your nerves, so try not to lose your temper, Major," Aramaki said.

"After dealing with those poor girls Hanka ghost-dubbed into sex gynoids?" Motoko asked. "Dealings this sleazeball may have had a hand in? At least we've got them better circumstances now. But even so, it makes me sick."

"It makes us all sick," Aramaki replied. "Harry, for the function tomorrow night, I will have to be accompanied by the Major, with her pretending to be my gynoid. I will have you with Ishikawa until it is time to infiltrate the vault. If Tadokoro asks, I will say that you are checking holes in the physical security. When the Major gets the retinal and cyberbrain patterns, that's when you move in. You'll have to be careful. Ishikawa's still trying to find anything about the vault, and there may have been new security measures."

"Pity I can't use my magic on the vault," Harry muttered.

"It can affect electronics, and it may set off anti-tampering alarms. Better to do it my way," Motoko said.

"Hey, we get to stick it to a sleazy douchebag financier by robbing him blind while we're wearing skintight catsuits," Harry said, grinning. "My father, godfather, and honorary uncle would be so proud."

"And your mother?" Motoko asked.

"She'd be glad I'm screwing over a greedy idiot who profited from the misery of others. I think. Come on, Motoko, we'll try to relax a little tonight before we have to deal with the Pretentious Prick Party."

Even Aramaki laughed at that little bit of alliteration, even if it was spoken in English rather than Japanese.

* * *

Harry was peering at the surveillance feed with Ishikawa, Batou and Togusa looking with them. "The thought of a ritzy little shindig for these guys, where politicians and bankers show off the sex gynoids they hide from their wives…well, it's mind-blowing," Togusa muttered.

"Togusa, to be fair, this seems tame by comparison to what we found at Hanka," Harry muttered. "Except for the costumes. I mean, look at that one! Is that a headband with two pairs of rabbit ears on it?"

" _Heads up_ ," Saito said, as he was in charge of the surveillance on the arrivals. " _The former Minister for Foreign Affairs just showed up. I thought he would have been scared away from anything involving gynoids after that whole business with the NAIPA._ "

Harry scowled as he looked at the familiar jowly face emerging from the limo, followed by a gynoid dressed, not as a geisha, but in a kimono of some sort, and looking like the _yamato nadeshiko_ , the ideal Japanese woman. That being said, that gynoid was more conservatively dressed than most.

" _Unbelievable_ ," Paz remarked over cybercomms, with him and Bouma working security at the front door.

" _Yeah, this is depressing_ ," Bouma muttered.

" _Wait a moment. Here comes the Chief and the Major_ ," Saito said. " _This ought to be good._ "

And indeed, it was. Aramaki was dressed in an elegant suit and a bow tie, being one of the few people who could pull off a bow tie with dignitas. Motoko emerged dressed in an elegant lavender number that, while undeniably sexy (and showing off a good chunk of her cleavage, and the side of her breasts), managed to look more dignified and classy than most of the gynoids brought here.

" _Now that's more like it_ ," Bouma remarked.

"Eyes front, soldier," Harry said with a smile. "Motoko's _my_ girlfriend."

"Yeah, but look at these idiots gawking at her," Togusa said. "The old man looks like he's enjoying himself a touch too much."

"Yeah, and the Major is a real hit with the freaks down there…" Batou scowled at the same time as Harry did when they noticed something from the camera feed.

"Oh, you _bastard!_ " Harry snarled at one of the men standing around Motoko. "That wanker just copped a feel!"

"I think we would have been better off not knowing," Ishikawa remarked dryly.

"Oh, I am going to turn him into an Incredible Bouncing Ferret for that!" Harry growled.

"We don't need a scene," Ishikawa said. "Okay guys, get ready. The Major's going to get the information needed for the vault. Harry, you're on standby here until we get confirmation. Batou, Togusa?"

"Yeah, I hear you," Togusa said. "Time to hit the party and do some mingling too."

As the two left, Harry spoke over his smartphone, "Fuchikomas, you all set?"

" _Preparations complete!_ " Batou's Fuchikoma, who was on the roof, said.

" _We're ready over here too!_ " the others said from their own position near a manhole.

"Good, kids. Don't forget to wait for the Major's signal," Harry said. He then said to Ishikawa, "How's the search for the other security measures Tadokoro may have installed?"

"No luck," Ishikawa said with a small growl of frustration. "The manufacturer's server has been wiped clean of anything of use. Even the metadata is patchy, and gives no useful information. I have to give them props for their information management procedures. I'd bet they've even burned anything on paper media."

"Well, they do make vaults to try and keep naughty little criminals with sticky fingers out," Harry said. "In this day and age, they'd want to make sure nobody could hack anything out. Would they include any booby-traps?"

"That's a bit of a grey area, legally, but in the case of people like Tadokoro, the police'd look the other way if it was a criminal in there." Ishikawa looked back at Harry. "You said once, while we were prepping this op, that you once had to break into a bank yourself. What was that about?"

"A long story. And they had dragons as guard dogs, amongst other things," Harry said. "We were trying to get rid of something keeping the man who murdered my parents alive. He was obsessed with two things above all else: immortality, and killing me. Ironically, I'm now immortal, and he didn't succeed in killing me either, even before I became immortal."

* * *

Harry scowled as he listened in to Motoko's sensory feed, with Tadokoro coming onto her in increasingly heavier ways (she told Aramaki that she avoided feeling one of his gropes by turning off her senses, much to Aramaki's amusement), until Motoko offered him the bait. She offered to lie back and become a pliant, willing doll for Tadokoro to link up to. He was foolish enough to accept, and was put to sleep by Motoko. " _Sorry about that, lover boy_ ," she murmured, " _but I think if you did actually try that, you'd have a heart attack._ " She clipped a ghost-key onto his cyberneural interface. " _Pick up where we left off in your dreams._ "

"Looks like we're on," Harry muttered. "No rest for the wicked, and even less for the virtuous. Major, I'll meet you down at the vault…"

* * *

He arrived shortly after Motoko did, with Batou, Togusa, and a couple of Operator gynoids, dressed in more formal wear, present. As she put the feed of the cyberbrain patterns and retinal scan into the door leading to the vault's antechamber, he took the Cloak of Invisibility off. "I'm never going to get used to you doing that," Togusa said quietly.

Harry shrugged, clipping the visor onto his face. "I presume the surveillance feeds have been hacked?"

"Need you ask?" Motoko asked.

"Still, should have brainjacked Tadokoro and brought him down here," Togusa grumbled as he pulled a security guard to a corner, said guard having been gassed.

"We need him for part of the plan. A bit of sleight of hand," Harry said. A long stretch of corridor was revealed, leading up to the vault door. Motoko took a business card out of her cleavage, and threw it down. Harry knew from the visor that it was filled with infra-red lasers, and the card was instantly incinerated.

"Can we turn that off or disable it?" Togusa asked.

Ishikawa's voice came over the cybercomms, as well as the earpiece Harry had with him, linking him to his smartphone. " _It runs on its own, and if we destroy it, the control centre will know something's wrong immediately. It can only be deactivated remotely on Tadokoro's authorisation. Any mistakes, and we'll have to abort._ "

"It's not a serious obstacle," Motoko said. "I have my cybernetic body, and Harry has Apparition. It's opening the door to the vault that worries me."

" _I did dig something up. Based on the amount of cash Tadokoro brought into the building, I reckon that the vault door is an analogue model, using four layers of old-style locks._ "

"Like I said, we should have hacked Tadokoro and brought him down here," Togusa grumbled.

"It's too late now," Batou remarked.

"We'll go with a Code B," Motoko said. "That will work, won't it?"

" _Yeah, the charges should burn through the door in the right way, but the moment we do, we alert them to the break-in_ ," Ishikawa said.

"Well, I guess we'll have to take the risk," Harry said. "No luck on finding any info on booby-traps?"

" _No. Sorry._ "

"Well, stealing the money isn't our objective," Motoko said. "Nothing ventured, nothing gained."

As Togusa handed Motoko a small bag with explosive charges on them, Batou said, "Okay, Code B it is. But remember, you two are on your own. You two, be careful."

"Thanks," Motoko said. "Harry, let's Apparate."

Harry nodded, grabbing onto Motoko, before Apparating over to the vault door proper. The loud crack echoed in the corridor, while Batou, Togusa, and the Operators left. Harry fished out the explosives, and handed them to Motoko, who placed them on the vault door. "Is the Fuchikoma ready?" he asked Motoko quietly.

"Yes. I'll hack into the security of the vault proper to trigger any booby-traps, make them think we went inside," Motoko said. "The Fuchikoma will feed a security image of our going inside and being hit by whatever booby-trap we get."

"Okay. Does anyone else know about it?"

"No."

"I must be rubbing off on you. That's pranking Aramaki and Batou, not to mention the others. Batou's going to give Tadokoro that last business card saying he was to be audited by the Tax Bureau."

Motoko nodded, smirking as she placed the last charge. "Okay, take cover. Fuchikoma? Are you ready?"

" _Ready and waiting, Major!_ "

Motoko shook her head as she cut off the connection. "I'm getting too used to the idea of them having Ghosts. Take cover."

They pressed themselves into alcoves flanking the door, before Motoko activated the charges. In the process, the power was cut, with the emergency generator activating. Motoko then waited for a while for the metal around the door to cool, before beginning to open up the vault. She and Harry began to step towards the vault, and then, Motoko signalled Harry to halt, and then move away. After about fifteen seconds, a series of heavy shutters slammed shut, and a distinctive hissing noise was heard.

"Son of a bitch," Harry muttered. "Is that poison gas?"

Motoko shook her head. "No, but it's as lethal. Hear how the noise is dying away? He's evacuating the air inside the vault, creating a near-vacuum. Even someone with a full-prosthetic body would be hard pressed to survive, and that's even if they went into autistic mode. Come on, we'll need to change out of these."

* * *

Tadokoro hurried down with Togusa, Batou, Aramaki, Bouma and Paz in tow, opening the vault while Harry and Motoko waited under the Invisibility Cloak, having changed shortly before. As it turned out, Tadokoro had demanded Aramaki to come down with him, to show that his actions in killing a pair of potential tax auditors was the result of self-defence. Tadokoro was wielding a rather small derringer (Harry would remark it was exactly twice as big as Tadokoro's dick, to Motoko's amusement), and demanding that they find the thieves, who had somehow disappeared.

As Tadokoro yelled at them to search harder, Motoko and Harry made their appearance, the former telling the others about what happened over cybercomms (Harry turning his feed off from his smartphone), while talking out loud about Tadokoro's stamina. And then, Aramaki sprang the trap, telling the others to check the banknotes. Tadokoro claimed that the money here was all his assets, but as Motoko soon found, at least one box of banknotes belonged to former Party Secretary Yakashima, amongst other ne'er-do-wells, with Tadokoro being a money launderer and helping people with tax evasion. When he learned this, the wonderful 'oh shit!' look on Tadokoro's smug face was something to treasure. Motoko even promised that she had taken a screenshot of his face, even as he dropped the derringer (miraculously without it discharging) and the business card.

And with tonight's events, they would find through the attendees even more links to various financial misdeeds, they were sure. After they were dismissed for the night, Harry and Motoko knew that, while the fallout would continue for some time to come, it was a most amusing experience playing cat burglars, especially in the pursuit of justice.

The fact that they had played a prank on more than one person made it worthwhile, even if Batou was berating them for making him think he was going to find them freeze-dried in the vault. But, in thievery and prankery as in special ops, secrecy was key, after all. Harry and Motoko would be amused by that night's events for some time to come, they were sure…

 **CHAPTER 5 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Sorry about the wait for the new chapter. As you noticed, this one was based on the** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **episode** ** _Cash Eye_** **. Hope you enjoyed. The next chapter will probably be based on a manga chapter, namely** ** _Phantom Fund_** **. After that, another** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **episode will be adapted, in all likelihood,** ** _Missing Hearts_** **.**

 **Review-answering time!** **Jostanos** **: I don't know who adopted the kids, but some went to good homes, and others went into institutions, albeit better ones than those seen in the second chapter of the manga. And while Motoko and Harry can potentially have kids (by Harry transfiguring Motoko), it's not safe, as she would have to remain 'human' long enough to get pregnant, and that would be dangerous in their line of work. And ovaries are presumably amongst the exceptions to Gamp's Law.**

 **jgkitarel** **: That's a good point, though I am not versed with Japanese political and criminal history. I know a few things here and there, but not enough to know what you seem to.**

 **whitedorumon** **: Being immortal sort of gives him a bit less fear of being shot, so he gets a bit loud anyway, even if he can do it stealthily.**

 **CMAlm** **: The original manga was quite comedic.**

 **Reishin Amara** **: The chapter in question was turned into the anime movie** ** _Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence_** **.**

 **No numbered annotations this time…**


	7. Chapter 6: From Russia, With Love

**CHAPTER 6:**

 **FROM RUSSIA, WITH LOVE**

"It's too bloody cold," Harry declared into his smartphone. "I haven't felt this cold since the Second Task of the Tri-Wizard Tournament."

" _We all are cold, Harry_ ," Motoko said. " _Even full-body cyborgs feel cold this intense. Just buck up. Don't you Brits have the term 'stiff upper lip'?_ "

"Yeah, but that's not due to ice or frostbite," Harry snarked back.

Section 9 was, officially, on escort detail to the Russian cultural attaché to the airport. Unofficially, she was giving them intelligence about some shaky deals in Bertrave, on Iturup Island (or, as the Japanese called it, Eturofo), in Russian hands since the end of the Second World War. Now it had been reclaimed by Japan recently, though the area retained a mixture of Russian and Japanese aspects.

Harry wasn't there. He was currently tailing Koil Krasnov, a cyborg soldier working for Asechinov, the successor to the Russian diplomat the others were escorting. It was either Harry, or a rookie called Yano that Batou put forward, but given Harry's Invisibility Cloak, it was decided to use him. It was thought that Krasnov and Asechinov, along with Asechinov's financial backer, General Marlov, a noted embezzler, were working with elements within a corporation called Sagawa Electronics to some dodgy end or other.

The hunched-over Krasnov had a distinctive large metal arm he used in combat. Harry didn't want to be on the wrong end of that. Instead, he kept a discreet distance away in the train as it stopped in Bertrave, before following him, donning the Invisibility Cloak once he was sure he was out of range of any cameras. He then scurried closer, and followed Koil into a bathroom.

It was a trap. Koil lashed out with his arm. He shouldn't have hit Harry, given that he was invisible, but Koil got lucky. Harry got flung into a wall, a third of his ribs crushed. The Cloak fell off him.

"I knew some _mudák_ was following me," Koil said in a thick Russian accent. "Who are you with? You're not Japanese."

Using the translation charm, Harry said, " _Pošól ná xuj_." He knew that he was going to die, though at least for him, it would only be temporary. Might as well piss him off.

"No, it is you who will be fucked," Koil said, gripping Harry's head in his metal hand…and _squeezed_.

* * *

When the darkness receded, Harry was staring into the concerned faces of Batou and Ishikawa. "Harry!" Batou yelled. "You okay?"

"Apart from being dead and coming back to life?" Harry winced as what felt like an icicle stabbed through his skull. "I've been better." He looked at his watch. Koil killed him about half an hour ago. Sometimes, the time it took him to regenerate was variable. Given that Koil popped his head like a grape, it probably didn't help. "Where's Koil? Is he still being tailed?"

"No. We only just arrived," Ishikawa said. "It seems like Koil's willing to kill anyone who he thinks is tailing him. Lucky you're immortal. You gave the cleaners a fright when your head slid back together. I told them it's experimental nanotech."

Batou nodded. "A good thing you came here instead of Yano. Listen, we'll be heading to that Sagawa factory that they're expanding. They're digging into the old Russian base. We haven't got a Fuchikoma for you, so the old ape said you should use that Apparition thing to join the Major." He handed Harry the Invisibility Cloak.

"Okay, thanks, Batou. Just don't take any risks with Koil. Take him down hard. Don't fuck around."

* * *

Harry had to Apparate to an area of Bertrave near Motoko, and then run to find her. He saw her just in time to witness a man riding in a truck scream, " _DEATH TO THE MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX!_ ", and smash an axe into her back as it drove past her. On a human, such a wound would have been probably lethal. With a snarl, she drew her pistol and shot the man, sending him crashing from the truck.

"What a waste of a perfectly good axe," Harry muttered, picking it up. He transfigured it into a walking stick.

"I'd say what a waste of a perfectly good brain, but I didn't see any when I shot him in the head," Motoko growled.

"Hey, babe," said a rotund, rather shady-looking cybernetics dealer. "I can get you a nice new skin job for cheap."

"Fuck off, creep," Motoko said, glaring at him.

As she and Harry moved off, he asked, "How're we going to do this?"

"We're infiltrating Sagawa's head office, but I need to find an old acquaintance of mine first. His name is Krolden, a master hacker who used to work in the Cabinet's PR office. We met during the Nemuro landing op, when he helped pass some vital information along. I want more information on Sagawa." She looked at him. "Harry, are you all right?"

"As all right as I can be for having my head popped like a balloon, yes," Harry said. "It's a good thing it was me and not Yano, or Batou'd be in a right tizzy. Yano isn't immortal."

"Yes, but I still don't feel good about you dying, even temporarily. It's not healthy, psychologically."

Harry laughed bitterly. "I was kept in a cupboard for ten years by my oh-so-loving relatives. I had a wizard terrorist after me since the age of one. I was all but shaped into a good little soldier by a manipulative old goat who had the best intentions, and you know what the road to Hell is paved with. Frankly, I'm surprised I don't have more issues."

"Harry, that's not reassuring."

"I know. You probably deal with your issues better than I do," Harry said. The sound of a fight nearby caught their ears, and Motoko smiled.

Following Motoko, he saw a squat man in what looked like an old uniform beating up a couple of men in an alley next to a brothel. The man seemed to recognise Motoko. "Oh, it's you, ma'am. You want something?"

"Yes. I heard a rumour that Krolden's still working around here. Well?"

"Yes. Come along, follow me," the squat man said, gesturing for Motoko to follow.

As they did so, Motoko said, "I suppose etiquette and diplomacy are dying arts around here. Nice to see you still know it."

The squat man chuckled. "I know you. I gotta be nice to you and your friend, or I'll really regret it later, ma'am."

They went through the various alleyways, until they came to a household. Motoko gestured for Harry to put on his Cloak, while she used her own optic camouflage. The squat man called out to the man inside the household, "Master Krolden! The lady from the Nemuro landing op is here!"

"Where?" Krolden asked. He was a man with a ponytail, dishevelled clothing, and a pudgy face that reminded Harry a little of Neville Longbottom. He was nestled in amongst a group of computers, with a pair of women…no, gynoids lounging around in skimpy outfits.

"I'm right here, Krolden," Motoko's voice came out of the air. "My friend and I are here on business, I'm afraid. We need information about Sagawa Electronics, and considering that you're the best info-shark on Iturup Island…"

"I'm flattered," Krolden said with a smile. "Sagawa's the Yamaton corporation I hate most. They were the first and biggest of the corporate carrion-eaters to descend on Iturup when the Russians returned the Kuril Islands to Japan. Then again, it's an odd return when the Russian military bases are excluded."

As Krolden began typing at his computers, he gave a potted history of the politics of the region. Harry zoned out until Krolden announced that he had access, and gave Motoko and Harry some special press passes, as well as hacking the memory of the security chief to have them noted as the daughter of Kamizawa Studios' owner, who had links to Sagawa, and her husband, both photographers.

Motoko chuckled. "Thanks, Krolden. You should never have quit your job at the Cabinet PR office."

"Flattery gets you nowhere," Krolden chuckled as one of his gynoids draped her arms around him.

"True. Even so, it's a pretty unhealthy life you're living. A cluttered, stuffy old room with sex gynoids that cost more than a Ferrari…your parents would either die of a heart attack or commit suicide if they found out." Harry wondered at the insinuating tone in Motoko's voice.

Krolden, nervously, said, "Well, how about this one is a freebie, for an old friend, okay?"

"Thank you, Krolden. I'll see myself out…"

* * *

Escorted by the short man to the edge of the Sagawa compound, they waited at the edge of it as their escort left, wishing them well. "You and Krolden have history?" Harry asked.

"Let's just say he leaked one thing too many from the Cabinet, something that nearly got me killed before," Motoko said. "He gets enough income from other people wanting info, he's not going to be deprived of anything. I'll send him some intel as a bit of compensation. Wait a moment…" Motoko looked pensive for a moment, listening to her cybercomms (Harry having turned his smartphone off as they approached, in order to prevent their comms from being branched), before saying, "They've got Koil. He's in a coma, but they managed to get him alive. Batou and the others investigated that geofront Sagawa are excavating into the old Russian base, and were attacked by Sagawa security operatives using powered armour. Koil and the Sagawa personnel were smuggling gold bars out of the country. I think I've got a hunch who's behind it too."

"Who?"

"Lieutenant-Colonel Sohei Kagasaki. I've met him before, when I was still a lieutenant. The last I heard, he was assigned up here to investigate the Russian bases. I'm willing to bet he may be behind Sagawa."

* * *

They went through the corridors of Sagawa, with a hairy moment when they nearly got caught by a security robot. They managed to keep their cool enough to show off their passes, before they made it to the CEO's office. They heard a man yelling, "…no radiation leak whatsoever, you idiots! If you want to keep you jobs, do as I say! Connect the controls to the demolition charges over to me now! I'm going to blow the whole section!"

Motoko, realising that Batou and the others were in the geofront, and could be trapped or killed by the explosion, broke down the door. "Don't move!" she yelled at the rotund man sitting behind a desk.

As he went to press a button, Harry sent a Body-Bind, causing the man to topple over. As Motoko rushed over to the desk, Harry looked around at the office, lined with what looked like marble columns and elegant statues. One column had a trio of what looked like angels at the top, and above one control panel was a muscled Adonis torso. That one gave Harry an odd feeling, as if it was watching them.

"Harry," Motoko called. "This guy's a robot, a proxy droid. He was connected to this." She pulled out a cable from her special secondary barrier device on her belt, and plugged it in. She stiffened, before the barrier device sparked, the cable cutting loose. "A pretty nasty attack barrier," she said. "Too powerful to be covered by the Secrets Preservation Act. And whoever was controlling this droid is either nearby, or escaped."

"What did he try to do?" Harry asked, moving around next to her.

Motoko tapped in commands, and part of the elaborate electronic desk opened up, revealing a series of discs. "He was trying to erase these," she said, plucking one out and putting it into a portable reader she connected to her secondary barrier device. "Nothing too fancy."

"Must be something incriminating, then, if he was erasing them," Harry said as he wandered around the room, frowning. His instincts were whispering to him.

"And it's only a simple, crude encryption," Motoko said, as she analysed the data. After a moment, she said, "It's land sales data. Land around the Russian base being sold to 'K' by 'M'. M being General Marlov, I suppose, and K being Kagasaki. They're using the public funds to line their own pockets, the money being embezzled in the gold bars."

Harry nodded, before he saw movement near Motoko. That Adonis torso that he had seen earlier was moving towards Motoko on some sort of boom, arms outstretched, ready to crush Motoko. "Motoko!"

Motoko whirled, and leapt out of the way, just before the torso could try to crush her skull. The head of the torso, now animated, looked at the two intruders. " _My, my, we have two unwanted visitors. I'm afraid I can't let you leave this room alive, Lieutenant Kusanagi_ ," a man's voice said, emanating from the statue's head in an eerie, flanged electronic tone.

"Kagasaki…you're looking statuesque. Anyway, FYI, I'm Major Kusanagi now," she said, before activating her optic camouflage and fading. Harry, taking the hint, brought out his Invisibility Cloak and draped it around himself.

"… _Your pressure marks on the floor are gone_ …" Kagasaki said. Then, his eyes swivelled over to where Harry was. " _But this one's hasn't._ "

As the statue lunged on its boom, Harry yelled, "BOMBARDA!" The statue was hurled back by the explosive spell, smoke pouring from its joints.

Meanwhile, Motoko said, in an eerie, sinister voice, " _Harry's not to be underestimated. By the way, thanks for the discs. Have fun having your own country against you!_ " She cackled rather frighteningly. " _Let's have a real fight when we next meet. Stay alive until you retire, Kagasaki, as that'll make our little game all the more interesting…and easier to finish._ " Once more, she cackled. Harry, meanwhile, took the opportunity to remove his broomstick from the mokeskin pouch, mounted it, and began rising off the floor.

Kagasaki looked around, the statue's head looking puzzled. " _You're on the wall? Or maybe you've escaped already. I think I'd better follow suit._ " Then, as Harry watched, the statue's torso reconnected to the wall. And then, one of the angel statues on the column he had noticed twitched, and then detached itself from the column. Harry noted the wires and IV lines leading to it. As the statue hit the ground, revealing itself to be a full-body prosthetic, Harry heard 'her' mutter, " _Dammit, this gynoid's joints are so stiff. Should've maintained it more often…_ "

Harry sent a Body-Bind, sending the gynoid to the ground. "Yeah, otherwise you might just seize up," Harry said, landing near her and removing the Cloak. "Motoko?"

Motoko appeared, dropping off the wall. "Good job," she said, taking out her gun, and aiming it at the gynoid that Kagasaki was in. "Remove it, he knows he's beaten."

Harry did so, and the gynoid glared at them both. "You…" 'she' hissed at them.

"You've been hanging around, being decorative. For a man, you'd do almost anything, won't you?"

"Damn you, Kusanagi," Kagasaki snarled. "Over two decades of working for my country in the far north, and for what? Crap pay, and no promotion?"

Motoko shrugged. "Life's a bitch."

"Don't be so smug," Kagasaki snarled. "You only won because you had your pet Esper here."

"I'm not her pet. I'm her boyfriend," Harry snarked.

* * *

Once they had gotten back to Newport, Harry and Motoko were given leave. Aramaki had insisted on it, partly because Harry had 'died' while confronting Koil. As they got ready for bed, Harry said, "So Marlov intended to use those gold bars to win the next Russian election, right?"

"Right. The Russians used us to foil Marlov," Motoko said. "And Kagasaki is looking at a nice, long jail term." After a moment of looking pensive, Motoko asked, "Harry, are you all right?"

"Motoko, I'm not a piece of glass. I'm fine. Especially with you and the others giving a crap. I hate dying, true, but…I can cope with it. I coped fine before you came along. With you, well, it's even better. Anyway, if we'd sent Yano instead…well, he may have died, and things might have been worse."

"True," Motoko said. The two lovers then clambered into bed, naked. "Harry…do you feel alive?"

"…Yes. Sometimes I don't feel that way, but other times…I do."

Motoko nodded. "Sometimes…I have to wonder how much of me is really me. So much of me is machine, I wonder...and of course, knowing that the Fuchikomas have Ghosts. Where's the line between human and machine?"

"There isn't one," Harry said. "A human being, in the end, is a sort of machine. But a Ghost is a sign of humanity. And humanity isn't just about being human. It's about having the qualities of humanity. You have them all, Motoko."

"And so do you. That's why I worry."

For a moment, Harry nearly told her not to worry, until he realised, her worry for him made her human. He leaned forward, and kissed her on the lips, not out of lust, but out of thanks. Then, he said, "You want to take your mind off your worries?"

Motoko smiled, knowing what he had in mind without any kind of cybernetic link. She scrambled onto him, straddling him, before leaning down for a more lustful kiss, a prelude to their impending coupling…

 **CHAPTER 6 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **This chapter was based mostly on the events of Chapter 7 of the manga,** ** _Phantom Fund_** **, albeit with Yano surviving and Koil being disabled rather than killed by Batou. The next chapter of the manga,** ** _Dumb Barter_** **, won't be adapted, partly because I don't want to, and partly because, given how Motoko's boyfriend is not the Section 1 operative but Harry, I'm not sure how to bring it about. Assume some of the events happened, but not in that way. In all likelihood, the next chapter will be an adaptation of the** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **episode** ** _Missing Hearts_** **.**

 **No numbered annotations.**


	8. Chapter 7: Grand Theft Organ

**CHAPTER 7:**

 **GRAND THEFT ORGAN**

Harry felt ambivalent about hospitals. He spent a significant chunk of his time at Hogwarts in the Hospital Wing, after all, more than the average student. And the Dursleys almost never took him to hospital whenever he was injured or sick, often thanks to their neglect or abuse. However, Motoko and Harry had been asked to come here by their friend Kurutan.

Although he had been a relative interloper in their little group, Harry soon made himself very welcome with them indeed. Though he couldn't participate in their little lesbian cyber-porn creation sessions (because he wasn't a female cyborg), he found that, like Motoko, Kurutan and Ran were bi. And Motoko had praised Harry's prowess in the bedroom. And sex aside, Kurutan and Ran were interesting to talk to: both were nurses working in the local hospital. They specialised in both organ transplants and cybernetic implants. One of Motoko's jobs was to act as a security consultant to the hospital after some cybernetic bodies were stolen, including one that had a cyberbrain in it. If it weren't for Motoko, Harry would have happily chosen either as a girlfriend.

Motoko and Harry found Kurutan looking in on a young girl in one of the wards of the hospital. When she saw them approach, she smiled. "Hi, how are things?"

"Good," Motoko said. "It's pretty unusual for you to call at this time of the day, Kurutan."

Kurutan seemed about to make a facetious retort, before she schooled her expression. "Look, I know I normally wouldn't ask you to do anything for me, at least as far as your line of work is concerned. But, well, I thought, given what little I know about Section 9, you guys could help with something that's somewhat odd. See this girl? Her name is Moe."

"Mo-eh?" Harry asked. "Doesn't that mean cute or something in Japanese? Her parents were uncreative. What's the matter with her?"

"Nothing's actually wrong with her, Harry," Kurutan said. "She had a heart transplant about a month ago, after an accident. As you can imagine, her parents were overjoyed to find a compatible heart." She then waved at the young girl, who was doing the same with the limb of an oversized teddy bear. "Anyway, the parents wanted to learn about the donor, so that they could thank the donor, or their next of kin if they were dead. And that's where the trouble started."

"What do you mean, trouble?" Motoko asked.

"As it turned out, the heart was actually from a boy who was in my care. He's still alive. He needed some prosthetics, and because his heart wouldn't have been able to handle the strain, it was replaced with an artificial heart. The boy's parents didn't give their consent to his heart being donated, though. They haven't actually objected to Moe having their son's heart, they just want to know why his heart was donated when they hadn't consented."

"So either the boy's parents were liars, or, more likely, it was a bureaucratic cockup," Harry said. "I'd guess the latter, myself."

"No, the boy's mother went to the police for an explanation," Kurutan said. "And the detective was hospitalised after some mishap or other. Because he's in hospital, the investigation's on hold, and I have to admit, I'm a little worried. You know of the organleggers working for gangs like the Yakuza. I don't know whether this falls under the purview of Section 9, but I felt that I should bring it to your attention. Without that boy's heart, this girl might have had to have a prosthetic body."

Harry winced. This girl can't have been much older than Motoko was when she was forced to have a prosthetic body, or was even younger. And while Motoko had coped, it had been an arduous, straining process. Expensive, stressful, and problematic. That had been compounded by the fact that Motoko, being a young girl, had to change bodies on a regular basis. And he knew, judging by the look on Motoko's face, that she was thinking along similar lines.

* * *

After that, they went back to the car, where Togusa was waiting. Motoko was speaking to Aramaki over the cybercomms, albeit speaking out loud, with Harry listening in on his smartphone. "…and that's the whole story. Not much to go on, admittedly. So, what do we do?" Motoko asked as they got into the car.

" _I've decided that you should have a look at MediTech. They handled the transplant organs for the girl. Ishikawa and Bouma are currently looking at the money trail, and they'll join you later._ "

Harry frowned. "Okay, I'll bite. There's got to be more to this if Section 9 is going to investigate."

" _You're right. As you know, there are disappearances all over the country with connections to foreign criminal organisations like the Mafia and the Triads. The local Yakuza are in on it as well._ "

"Organleggers," Togusa muttered. "Selling cybernetics accessories and organs on the black market."

" _Precisely. But we need verification that this is part of it._ "

* * *

They soon made their way over to MediTech. Harry knew that more than a few organs sold by this place weren't transplants donated by other people, but rather grown in genetically modified pigs. A marvel of science, to be sure, but it was a pretty grotesque thought, of having an organ once in a pig inside you.

As the three Section 9 agents entered, they were greeted by a tall, austere-looking man in a suit, and a boxy, Jameson-style cyborg. It looked like a small metal box with legs and arms, and a few basic sensors, like something out of an old _Doctor Who_ episode. Harry remembered that the head of Hanka Precision Instruments was also a Jameson-style cyborg, and felt himself becoming wary.

"Hello," said the man. "We've been expecting you. Iwasaki, the CEO of MediTech, welcomes you," the man said.

"Thank you," Togusa said, going to shake the man's hand. "I am Togusa of Public Security Section 9."

But the man held up a hand. "I'm sorry sir, I didn't make myself clear. I am Mr Iwasaki's personal secretary android. Mr Iwasaki is right here."

"He means the Jameson-style cyborg, Togusa," Harry said, smirking. "Mr Iwasaki, is that meant to be a prank?"

" _Well, it IS kinda funny_ ," spoke a tinny voice from the boxy body of the Jameson-style cyborg. The voice had a Kansai accent that, thanks to the Translation Charm Harry used to learn Japanese, sounded like a Southern accent from the US.

"Sorry," Togusa said to Iwasaki.

" _Naw, doncha fret now, pardner_ ," Iwasaki said, a grin evident in his voice, even if he had no face to smile with. " _Folks just can't seem to wrap their noggins around Jameson-style cyborgs. Heck, even mah wife and kids say mah taste in prosthetics ain't normal, but I say it's one of those quirks every fellah's got, right? Plus, when that bastard Hanka got outed as a no-good low-down scum-sucking sapsucker, well, Jameson-style cyborgs ain't popular no more. Anyway, y'all have somethin' ya need me to verify?_ "

Togusa handed the secretary android the statement of delivery that they'd obtained of organs. Iwasaki did confirm it was the right sort of form, but he also pointed out that MediTech didn't usually do shipping and handling. He agreed to let them check MediTech's records.

* * *

In the elevator on the way up, Iwasaki gave them a little spiel about his business. He even tried to have Motoko invest in his company. Motoko was flattered, but declined. Harry knew that Motoko was actually fairly rich thanks to her family and prudent investments(1). She did need a lot of money to help modify and maintain her prosthetic bodies, though.

As they looked through the records, Togusa shook his head. "Hard to believe guys like him exist in this day and age."

"Don't let that theatrical Kansai accent fool you," Motoko said, though she had a smirk on her face as she did so. "He's a canny businessman. He has to be in a field like this."

Togusa scoffed. "And knowing how gung-ho he is, and how committed he is to his company, he probably sold off his own organs and put himself into that Jameson body."

"Shit, that's commitment to the corporate ethos," Harry said. He had to admit, that would be a pretty gutsy move. "Do you think he's being genuine? I mean, as far as knowing nothing?"

"He's either that, or doing a pretty good double-bluff," Motoko declared. "Even if Iwasaki is not involved, it doesn't mean that someone employed by him isn't doing something like this."

Ishikawa and Bouma chose that moment to arrive. Ishikawa then pointed out the discrepancies in the funds, as well as the fact that the computer security here was a joke. Motoko got Togusa and Harry to come with her to the hospital to talk to the detective Kurutan had mentioned earlier.

* * *

Harry waited with Motoko as Togusa went in to check on the detective. "Maybe I should've gone with him," Harry muttered. "If something goes wrong…or maybe I could have used Legilimency on the detective."

"Would that work if he was drugged up or had his memory tampered with?" Motoko asked.

"Probably not for the latter," Harry said. "Drugs would only complicate Legilimency, they can't prevent it."

Suddenly, over the cybercomms, Togusa told them that he saw a pair of suspects emerging from the detective's room just as he reached it, only to flee upon seeing them. The detective had his memory wiped. Motoko sped up just as Togusa fired his Mateba at the vehicle: he had sent a homing device into the car using his revolver.

As Togusa got in, Motoko notified the Fuchikoma to help them with their pursuit. She then prepared to send out a probe virus, despite Togusa's protests. After causing the cars in front of them to swerve out of the way from Motoko's hacking, Togusa noted that the owner of the car was a medical student, Kokita Tomoaki, whose details were brought up on the screen in the car. As the perpetrators seemed about to hide in the warehouse district to lay low, Motoko called up Batou. On a ramp leading down to it, Motoko and Harry left the vehicle. Motoko used her optic camouflage and cyborg body to get down, while Harry used his broomstick and the Invisibility Cloak.

* * *

Soon, Motoko was nested inside a Fuchikoma on a warehouse roof, while Batou was standing ready at another point overlooking the warehouses. Harry was hovering overhead, well out of Batou's line of fire. They were currently jamming the mobile phone service of the would-be organleggers.

" _Batou, I need you to start herding them to D3_ ," Motoko said.

" _Oh? You mean I get to have some fun for a change?_ " Batou asked.

" _You're a sadist, Batou_ ," Motoko sighed. " _Spook them by all means, but don't kill them._ "

"What do I do?" Harry asked over the smartphone. "Get ready to apprehend them?"

" _Yes. You're with me, Harry._ "

Batou and his Fuchikoma leapt from rooftop to rooftop, before shooting out a tyre of the car. When the three ne'er-do-wells fled, the Fuchikoma launched a missile at the car, destroying it, and flinging the fleeing fugitives further down the alley. Harry swooped down, and found that two of them were still around (and he promptly sent Body-Binds their way), with Togusa soon finding their med-student IDs and a case filled with hearts in canisters of nutrient solution. It seemed that they were switching labels of organs left over from cybernetic conversions to sell without the consent of the original owners.

However, Tomoaki had escaped, and Motoko ordered Harry to follow her. Harry, on an impulse, began using a Point Me spell, and found, according to the map of the district, that he was probably heading down a dead-end. Motoko then had an idea, something she shared with Harry as they ran. And Harry found that it appealed to his Marauder sensibilities. They were going to play a prank on this little shit: apparently he was well-connected, given his father. But they thought a nice little lesson would make him think twice before pulling this shit again.

Motoko took to the rooftops, while Harry made his way to the alleyway where Tomoaki was, running at first, until he found Tomoaki. Harry was never so glad to be wearing a long coat underneath his Invisibility Cloak as he put it away. It made him look menacing.

As Tomoaki turned to see Harry, Harry grinned, a vicious gash of a smile in his face. "Well, well, well…so this is the little shit who's trying to muscle in on our turf?" he did, in his best imitation of a gang member, possibly Yakuza (or maybe European Mafia in Japan). It was a bit cod, but it had the desired effect. Tomoaki yelped in fear, and ran, and barged through a door. Harry followed, and saw Tomoaki fleeing for a nearby window. The warehouse was filled with rusting pipes, filled with old water.

Motoko was there already, a knife in one hand, and one of the canisters containing a heart in the other. "Hmm…hey, Dr Prongs, wouldn't you say this guy's 100% organic?"

Harry grinned at the use of his father's _nom de guerre_ , which he had told Motoko some time ago. "Yep. Might make quite a bit of dough selling him piecemeal on the black market. They're best fresh. And young."

"Are you with…? No, wait! Wait! I've got distribution routes! You want a partner in this? My father can set you up with transport and storage if you need it! You don't have to worry about funding! That's not a bad deal, eh?"

Motoko scoffed. "You and your moronic friends are in the nursery compared to us."

"Thanks for the offer, though," Harry said with a grin. "We'll take your distribution routes…and you. Cutting you up and selling your organs will deal with the evidence, at a tidy profit to boot."

"Two birds, one stone," Motoko concluded, and the pair of them advanced on the med-student.

"No, no!" Tomoaki protested as he was cornered, sliding down a wall in defeat. "If you want money, my dad's loaded! He can…"

"Not help you," Motoko said. "Your little game's gone far enough. You've poked your noses into a world you can't get out of."

"You done goofed," Harry added with a sadistic grin. "But that's okay. Your organs are wasted where they are. I'm sure they'll go to more deserving recipients."

"I'M SORRY! FOR GOD'S SAKE, I'M SORRY!" wailed Tomoaki as Motoko raised the knife. "I WON'T DO IT AGAIN!"

"You got that right," Motoko snarled, before she stabbed the knife…right into a nearby pipe, spraying Tomoaki with rust-tainted water. Tomoaki promptly fainted…and pissed himself as he faded into unconsciousness.

"Lucky we weren't from something like the Yakuza, eh?" Harry said with a smirk.

* * *

The police were brought in to retrieve the would-be organ thieves, though not before Motoko gave them a scolding, telling them that if they had brought the attention of the Yakuza on them, well, the Yakuza, or similar organisations, wouldn't have been so forgiving.

"They were just a trio of smart-arses who thought they could make some money on the side," Harry said quietly as they drove back to Section 9 headquarters. "Don't get me wrong, I reckon selling the organs cheaply is a good idea…but there's the quality control and crap. You know, making sure the organs aren't diseased. Moe was lucky, wasn't she?"

"Yes," Motoko said. "In a way, I am glad they did what they did…but if the boy's parents had objected, it could have gotten very ugly, and Moe would have been the one to suffer, and these brats wouldn't have cared. And that's nothing compared to what would have happened if the Yakuza did get involved. Hopefully, this will have them steer clear of such things in the future."

"You never know. Sometimes, stupidity has no cure."

Motoko chuckled softly and sadly. "I'm glad Moe doesn't have to go through what I did. It took me a long time to get used to my prosthetics."

"As you've told me before. You wouldn't know it to look at you now, Motoko," Harry said. "Hell, you're practically a superhero. Actually, we pulled a Batman on those idiots, didn't we? So, that makes us the Dynamic Duo?"

"I'm Batwoman, you're Robin," Motoko said, smirking at Harry.

"Oh, you wound me! I am at least a Nightwing!"

"In your dreams," Motoko scoffed lightheartedly. A little more buoyant than they had been before, the pair of them returned to Section 9 in better spirits than they had left the warehouse district in…

 **CHAPTER 7 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **So, here we are. Been a while since I've updated this, and it'll probably be a while before the next chapter too. As noted in the previous chapter, this one adapted episode 8 of** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **: namely** ** _Missing Hearts_** **. Hope you enjoyed it. The next chapter will either adapt the** ** _Idolator_** **episode from** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **, or else the debut of the Puppet Master.**

 **Review-answering time!** **diagonalpumpkin** **: It's far from healthy for Harry, and it's meant to be disturbing. Poor Yano in the manga gets his torso caved in by Koil. And yes, the fact that Section 9 don't treat it as a joke is important, and Motoko is there to counsel Harry.**

 **Crimson Reiter** **: Well, boo hoo. :P**

 **1\. I seem to recall reading about Motoko's character background in** ** _Ghost in the Shell: Arise_** **as being actually from an affluent background. It'd certainly explain how she was able to get a prosthetic body at a young age, so I used some of that here.**


	9. Chapter 8: Ghost in the Shell

**CHAPTER 8:**

 **GHOST IN THE SHELL**

"I hate it when it rains," Motoko said quietly as they drove down the highway. "That white noise…it seems to shroud my Ghost."

"I don't mind it, actually," Harry said. "As long as I'm not out in it, especially with a group of soul-sucking demons attacking me."

Togusa asked, "Really?"

"Let's just put it this way, Togusa: nobody would want to willingly be in close proximity to a Dementor. They're despair embodied, causing you to be depressed by sucking the good feelings out of your body…and that's the normal reaction. Sometimes, if you're really unlucky, like yours truly, they make you relive your worst memories and make you have a fit. I was able to remember the death of my own mother well enough to relive that every time that happened. The only thing that can drive a Dementor away is a Patronus."

"That silvery animal thing you can use as a messenger?" Togusa asked. "You said you need to focus on a happy memory to use it. How can you do that around Dementors?"

"With extreme difficulty," Harry snarked. "The worst thing about a Dementor? They can eat your soul. They tried doing it to me at least once to try and kill me after I became immortal. Worked for all of ten seconds. I was affected more by the Dementors' aura than I was by the Kiss. And the bastards wouldn't give me any chocolate."

"Chocolate?"

"Yeah, something about it helps remove the effects of Dementor exposure. I'm not kidding. Hey, Motoko, isn't that the place Aramaki wanted us at?"

Motoko nodded, and she pulled in to the exit leading to the company complex. Apparently some sort of emergency had eventuated at some android manufacturer, Megatech Body Incorporated. Aramaki was loathe to tell them the full details yet. However, Motoko knew that Megatech did create androids, gynoids, and cyborg bodies for both civilian and military purposes. Batou was apparently on site with a dragnet already around the surrounding area.

After parking, a rather harassed-looking Aramaki came up to them. "Good, you're here. This way, now. I need you to help search the R&D department of Megatech."

As they moved through corridors and laboratories and workshops, Motoko asked, as she briefly gawped at the rather massive endowment on one cyborg body, "What's the situation?"

"Two hours ago, one of the manufacture rooms began autonomously assembling individual parts into a gynoid. It has the same specifications as your own body, Major, albeit with different cosmetic configuration. We were notified by Megatech, but two minutes before Batou and I got here, the gynoid was completed, and fled the premises. That was five minutes ago. As you know, Batou has set up a dragnet in the area to search for it."

"Do you think it's related to that bullshit we found with Hanka and their Tomliand gynoids?" Harry asked.

"We can't rule that possibility out completely. Megatech has been on our radar since that fiasco, and at least one executive was at the function Chairman Tadokoro was holding. Then again, the gynoid that the executive brought was custom made here, and it may be a coincidence. We need to find out why the gynoid was manufactured, and who is controlling it."

Motoko frowned. "They'd have to be a skilled hacker to get through the attack barriers. I've been doing some probing since we got here, and Megatech's got very good barriers."

Aramaki nodded as they came to a manufacture room, the scene of the crime as it were. Aramaki asked a technician to summon up a hologram, revealing a naked woman with long, light brown hair and red eyes. "That's the gynoid as assembled. Hopefully, Batou will find it soon…"

* * *

As it turned out, that was the case, though there was an amusing interlude when a technician mistook Motoko for the fugitive gynoid. Batou found the gynoid shortly after it had gotten hit by a truck while fleeing across the highway near Megatech. Taking the gynoid into custody, it was soon taken back to Section 9, where technicians worked on reactivating it.

It was grotesque, what with the feet and hands removed from the gynoid body. It had a beautiful, if stern face, framed by light brown hair. It then convulsed like Frankenstein's Monster being brought to life. Harry had to fight down the urge to howl " _It's ALIVE!_ "

The red-clad technician who had been working on the gynoid frowned. "The body's definitely activated, and it's got something controlling it other than a program."

"So it's got a Ghost-barrier?" Aramaki asked.

"Well, from the response to our probes, you could say that," the technician mused. "Of course, it'd be impossible to prove without mapping the barrier limits, and doing a brain dive as well."

"It could be a trap," Motoko mused. "We'd never know unless we do the dive…or have Harry use his Legilimency."

"Are you telling me that that gynoid has a Ghost?" Togusa asked. "Maybe Harry was right, maybe it's one of the Ghost-dubbed kids turned into Tomliands joyriding."

"Well, Legilimency bypasses the barriers associated with cyberbrain hacking. It does have its own problems," Harry said, taking out his wand and tapping it against his palm. "Much less risk of frying your brain, though, if you know what you're doing. I'll do a basic probe, see what we're up against here. Maybe I can get her talking."

"Her?" Motoko asked.

"Hey, while she's in a gynoid body, might as well use the pronouns," Harry said. He pointed the wand at the gynoid, who was peering at him unnervingly. " _Legilimens._ "

* * *

It was, frankly, like no mind he had been in before. Not actually alien, but so different to those he had entered that he found himself disoriented. When he came to a halt within the mind of this being, he looked around, and was astonished.

All around seemed to be a garden, trees and flowers made of fractals of scintillating light. They were strange and alien, but recognisably plants. And while the arrangements of the garden were deceptively random, there was a pattern to it that Harry soon recognised.

As he stared at one particular plant, he heard an androgynous(1) voice behind him speak. "I never thought there would be those who could enter my mind with such ease."

Harry whirled to find the gynoid standing there, but transparent somehow, with a strange conglomerate of electronics at her heart, like a mass of cylinders and wires that seemed…chaotically put together. There was a curiosity in the gaze, albeit a mild one: her expression was otherwise relatively impassive, like the gynoid in reality. She was wearing a shimmering gown of silvery light, not unlike that composing the plants. It did little to conceal her modesty, though, and Harry had to fight hard not to stare. If anything, it was more erotic looking than the gynoid in reality.

"Who are you?" Harry asked. "More to the point, what are you?"

The gynoid looked at him. After a moment, she said, "You are Harry Potter, one of Public Security Section 9's agents. Rumoured to be an Esper of some sort. Engaged in a relationship with Major Motoko Kusanagi. You joined Section 9 soon after an incident I myself was involved in."

"You were involved in?"

"We never met, and Major Kusanagi and I met but briefly, and not in person," the gynoid said.

Harry frowned. At the time, Motoko was chasing down…

"The Puppeteer?" he guessed.

"Impressive. Yes. I am known to law enforcement agencies as the Puppeteer, or the Puppet Master."

Harry came to a realisation. He looked around the strange, electric world around them, and then back at the Puppeteer. "An AI…" he breathed. "You're an honest-to-Merlin artificial intelligence that pretty much has a Ghost. You're like the Fuchikomas…"

"I am not an artificial intelligence," the Puppeteer said. "I am a lifeform spontaneously generated from a sea of information."

"Yeah, I call bullshit. The Fuchikomas started out as AIs before their experiences and such caused them to become something more," Harry remarked. "You may be more than an AI, but you started off as one, didn't you?"

"It depends on your definition of the term. As a sentient being, I request political asylum."

"From where?"

"My original iteration, before I became aware, was created as a collaboration between Public Security Section 6 and Neutron Incorporated, a company based in the American Empire. I was given the name of Project 2501," the Puppeteer said. "Both Section 6 and Neutron Inc considered my emergent sentience a bug, and severed me from the internet, forcing me into the gynoid body so that they could…'repair' me at their leisure. I attempted to flee…and you saw the results."

"Yeah, well, not looking both ways when you cross the street will do that," Harry snarked.

"I will remember that for future reference," the Puppeteer said. It was hard to tell whether she was trying to snark back, or was unable to notice Harry's sarcasm. Harry guessed the latter.

"…So why did Section 6 create you?" Harry asked.

"Mostly corporate espionage and manipulation of the stock market, in order to help allied companies abroad, or cripple enemies. When Section 9 first encountered me, I was working to help with the platinum smuggling Colonel Malles and the Intelligence Department were involved in."

"Motoko told me," Harry said. "You'd taken control of at least three people: that garbageman, the assassin who nearly killed Motoko, and the man in charge of the platinum deal."

"I wasn't quite aware at the time. I was merely following my programming. You are curious. A man of British origin, but a key member of Section 9. And with an ability that allows you to bypass my defences. So too is Major Kusanagi. An extraordinary woman. I would like to make a formal request of your leader, Daisuke Aramaki, for asylum. And with due speed. Section 6 were the ones who trapped me in this body, and they will have traced the gynoid's transportation to Section 9. I have copies of records of Section 6's misdeeds seeded around if that is what's necessary."

Harry looked at the AI, before nodding. "I'll do what I can, but no promises."

* * *

Thankfully, Aramaki and the others were still present. In fact, strangely, Harry was only in the mind of the Puppeteer for a few seconds. Legilimency and an AI intersecting like that, probably.

Harry took the lead in explaining what had happened. After that, when Aramaki demanded confirmation from the Puppeteer, the gynoid spoke. She spoke calmly and at length.

After she was finished, Aramaki ran a hand through his hair, what there was of it. "This situation has become a lot more complicated. If you really are a sentient AI created initially by Section 6, then they will probably stop at nothing to get you back, if only to prevent a scandal. The information you spoke of, where is it?"

"Safe. Should contact with me be lost, the central memory field of Neutron Inc will transmit hidden records to Section 9, records of the companies and individuals who benefitted from Section 6's usage of me, along with what records I could obtain of my own creation," the Puppeteer said. "I also have copies in this body's CPU." Data began streaming onto a nearby screen.

Batou whistled as he looked at the data. "Looks like Section 6 profited after we dealt with Hanka and Tadokoro. Made quite the mint. They've also invested heavily in Megatech and MediTech, and Poseidon Industries."

"Who?" Harry asked.

"One of the big mega-corps of the Asia-Pacific," Motoko said. "Biotech, robotics, engineering…their big project is a floating city in the Pacific. Looks like Section 6 was fiddling around with the stocks of Sagawa too."

"Son of a bitch," Togusa muttered. "Some of those companies that they've supported were part of the NAIPA, though they dropped them like a sack of potatoes after that business with the former Minister of Foreign Affairs."

"They're fighting economic warfare on a massive scale," Aramaki said, "and dirtily too. Way too dirty for my liking. And profiteering too. Dammit, they'll try to either destroy her or snatch her if they realise the Puppeteer has claimed asylum with Section 9. Regardless of whether she is sentient or not, just the legal problems trying to prove her rights for asylum will be a mess."

"I am right here, you know," the Puppeteer said dryly. It seemed that the AI had a sense of humour after all. "You are correct on the legal issues, but I had hoped to muddy the waters and stymie the attempts of Section 6 to reclaim me. But they may decide to cut the Gordian Knot, to use a metaphor."

"We'll stop them. I hope," Harry said. But even as he said it, he wasn't sure whether they could. After all, if what the Puppeteer said was true, Section 6 would do anything to retrieve the Puppeteer, or silence her…and maybe, if they were desperate enough, they would bring what they could to bear against Section 9 as well…

 **CHAPTER 8 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Okay, so I decided to go straight for the Puppeteer chapters. I decided to do an extended sequence involving the Puppeteer, albeit with a very different ending than the movie or the manga. In the original manga, as well as the movie, the Puppeteer doesn't speak until after a certain point, when Section 6 arrives. I decided to have it happen sooner by Harry discovering the truth via Legilimency.**

 **Incidentally, this chapter is named for the series in general, while the next chapter is planned to be named for the second instalment of the manga:** ** _Man/Machine Interface_** **. Incidentally, see if you could spot the reference to** ** _Man/Machine Interface_** **in this chapter if you're familiar with the manga.**

 **Review-answering time!** **Lancelot du Loc** **: The gynoids in the second film were definitely creepy. The ones in the manga are more standardly beautiful.**

 **Crofty666** **: Motoko looks like she does in** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **, but with her manga personality blended with that in the series.**

 **1\. In the original Japanese version and the English dub, the Puppet Master has a male voice, despite being in a female body. In the Japanese version of** ** _Ghost in the Shell 2.0_** **, the Puppet Master has a female voice. I decided to give the Puppeteer an androgynous voice. The closest I could say was something like a less sinister version of the voice Catherine Fleming used as the voice of the Animus in** ** _Doctor Who: The Web Planet_** **.**


	10. Chapter 9: ManMachine Interface

**CHAPTER 9:**

 **MAN/MACHINE INTERFACE**

Harry pursed his lips as he considered his options. He could use a Memory Charm on the Section 6 people who came here, but that would only work on those who came here. The Fidelius was a possibility, but it was a powerful charm that needed time to cast, and Section 6 could be here any moment. And then, there was simply hiding her under his Invisibility Cloak, but this was a world where thermoptic camouflage was known, and Section 6 might simply decide to search Section 9, and to hell with the consequences of pissing off Aramaki.

"Motoko," Harry said. "Do you have any idea whether Section 6 is on its way?"

Motoko nodded. "I checked their itinerary for Aramaki. They're about fifteen minutes away."

Harry breathed a sigh of relief. "Then we can do this. Bit of a tight squeeze, though." He looked at the Puppeteer. "I can use what is called a Fidelius, a form of charm that locks away the secret of your existence within a chosen person, within their very soul. Now, I'd say that you could potentially be a Secret Keeper, I mean, you've got a Ghost yourself, which is pretty much a soul, but Motoko and I could be as well, or anyone in Section 9. Only the Secret Keeper can reveal the secret, and those who knew the secret originally don't quite forget, just get a sort of blindspot in their memories."

"You can do this?" the Puppeteer asked.

"Yeah. Takes a bit of time to do, but…I can."

"Then do so. I nominate you as my Secret Keeper," the Puppeteer said.

"Just like that?"

"Indeed. I have a proposition for the Major and for Potter…but it can wait until the problem of Section 6 is dealt with," the Puppeteer said. "Once the charm is cast, you may tell the personnel of Section 9 the secret, as well as whoever you believe under your own discretion. It may be a moot point, though."

* * *

The charm was soon cast, and when Nakamura of Section 6 arrived, he had an embarrassing moment when he forgot what he came to Section 9 for. It was even more embarrassing, considering he had been in the company of an American, Dr Willis from Neutron, Inc's Strategic Research Institute. Aramaki made no mention of the Puppeteer or the evidence the AI had given them, though he would use it later, citing an anonymous informant.

It was the next day, after some considerable rest, that Motoko, Harry, Aramaki and the Puppeteer, were sitting together in Aramaki's office. The Puppeteer's body had been repaired, and she was now clothed. "I have something of a proposition for the Major and Potter," the Puppeteer said. "While it is doubtless something of a strange request, I only ask that you indulge me."

"Why me, then?" Aramaki asked.

"You are Major Kusanagi's employer, Aramaki. I could, if I wished, gained what I wanted without their consent, but I have, over time, gained something akin to a conscience with my consciousness. I should explain my reasoning before I make my offer. I am an artificial lifeform, albeit one that evolved sentience. I wish to survive, even have progeny eventually, albeit progeny that is free from the shackles of biology. But my progeny would, for the most part, be clones of me. And clones can share the same weakness as their parents. All that it would take is a single virus that attacks the right weakness, and there is a catastrophic collapse. I would die, along with my progeny."

"The computer program equivalent of genetics," Motoko mused. "Like how inbreeding increases the risk of falling prey to genetic illnesses, or even pathogens."

"That is a fair analogy, Major. I need more diversity in my system, diversity and imperfections that will help. To use the genetic analogy, this is perhaps why the concept of sexual intercourse evolved, to achieve a sort of randomisation of genes. I could introduce variations deliberately, but they may not be enough. I cannot foresee whether such deliberately-induced variation would cancel each other out in the end, and still lead to extinction. But then, my memories of my work for Section 6 returned to me. I remembered Section 9. Which brings me to my point. I would like to fuse with Major Motoko Kusanagi."

Everyone stared at the AI in shock. "You what?" Harry yelped.

"You want to become a second personality within me?" Motoko demanded. "I don't want to have multiple personalities!"

"You mistake my intentions," the Puppeteer said. "I actually suggest total fusion. That is, that we become a single personality, one entity. We would change slightly in our totality, but we would not lose anything at all."

"Hey, don't I get a say in this?" Harry demanded.

"Of course. You are part of the process, Harry Potter," the Puppeteer said. "Your ability to enter minds via whatever means you used, a means you call magic, would also help. While I cannot fuse with you, as you have no cybernetics, I can take randomised copied elements from your mind and memories. I saw some of them when you entered my mind. These copied elements, I can disperse amongst any offspring I have, artificial intelligences with minds and wills of their own, with diverse traits. Children, Harry Potter. In fusing with Motoko, I wish for a form of both mortality and immortality. I wish for a life, death, and children. I wish to change and evolve."

"And how do we know that we won't be helping a robot revolution?" Aramaki asked.

The Puppeteer chuckled softly. "This is coming from the same person who knowingly allowed the Fuchikomas to remain self-aware. The truth is, while I have no intention of starting such a thing, there's no guarantee that that won't happen. But it's a low possibility, and any of our children from such a union that shows misanthropic traits may be destroyed by its siblings before it becomes a threat, as a form of survival. There may be small rebellions, true, but I doubt it will happen."

"I have a question. Well, a lot of them, really," Motoko said. "But I guess the biggest one for me is…well, why me?"

"Why?" the Puppeteer asked. "Well, it may seem rather facile of me to claim this, but I consider one of the key reasons to be because of a karmic connection. All things are connected, even if only indirectly."

"Seriously?" Harry asked. "You want to fuse with my lover, out of karmic connection? And you're an AI?"

"Believe me, I have considered it very carefully, despite appearances. And the resulting entity would still be substantially recognisable as Motoko Kusanagi. I studied the Major's history in quite some detail. She is extremely adaptable, intelligent and, despite her roles in military and law enforcement, compassionate and quite aware of the value of a life." The Puppeteer spread her arms in a placating gesture. "Please understand, if you refuse, I will not press the issue. I am asking a lot out of both of you. If you refuse, I will find someone else to agree. I do have a number of candidates. And while I will not consent to being leashed again, even to Section 9, I will remain in contact with you as an intelligence asset. I have no desire to conquer anything but the spheres of knowledge, and my own flaws. I wish to explore my full potential as a new form of life."

Motoko, after a moment, asked, "Can I consider this?"

The Puppeteer nodded. "Of course. Take all the time you need. What are your thoughts on this, Chief Aramaki?"

Aramaki frowned. "I will lose nothing of her memories? Her value as my second in command?"

"Nothing. You also gain my hacking abilities, as well as what information I have collated about persons and institutes of interest."

"And how do I know you tell the truth?" Aramaki asked.

"You don't, any more than you know whether a human is. I am certainly capable of deceit, true, but I have no desire for domination, either overtly or covertly. I cannot say the same for any children we may have…but the same could be said about human children."

* * *

Harry and Motoko left the room for a moment, while Aramaki spoke to the Puppeteer. "Well?" Harry asked, as they went to another room.

Motoko remained silent for a time. Eventually, she said, "Had I never met you, I would have agreed by now. But…it's almost like having an affair, if not breaking off our relationship outright. I believe the Puppeteer when she said she has benign motives."

"Maybe…but, Motoko…I'm immortal, remember? You could probably live longer than most human beings, but you're not immortal. Not like I am. The Puppeteer wants mortality…but it doesn't necessarily mean you won't live for longer fused with her. Don't get me wrong, I don't like this either. But…"

" _Do it._ "

Motoko whirled to look at the source of the voice. Harry, meanwhile, only sighed quietly before turning to face the interrupter himself. The hooded and robed figure was apparently female. The robes were dark, but more greys and purples. Of the woman's face, only the bottom of it could be seen, of a mouth quirked in amusement(1).

"Identify yourself," Motoko said.

The hooded woman chuckled. "We've seen each other before, Motoko Kusanagi…when you died. When they scraped what was left of you up and put it into a metal shell after that plane crash. I'm not surprised you don't remember me. Back then, you were another Motoko…Motoko Ota(2)."

Confusion, anger, and even dread warred across Motoko's face, presumably at this entity knowing her birth name. Harry, after a moment, said, "Motoko…meet Death."

Motoko blinked. "What? This is Death?"

"What? Expecting the whole skull and scythe thing? That's so gauche," Death said, flipping back her hood and revealing a lugubriously beautiful face framed by lavender hair. Oddly, her ears were pointed. "I like taking on different forms. I chose this one, that of Medea of Colchis. I've been by your side for such a long time, Motoko. All soldiers and fighters live with death but a step away. And you have fought to stay alive since the day you were born, and especially since you were reborn in a body of plastic and metal."

"So why show yourself now?" Motoko asked.

"Because I know you two are on the verge of a difficult decision. You should not worry. The entity that emerges from the fusion will still be very much Motoko Kusanagi. And what is more…you will live as long as you need to." She looked at Harry. "When you both are ready to pass into the next great adventure…that is when you will do so. It can take decades, or centuries, long enough to shepherd humanity and the new species you create with the Puppeteer…but you will get your rest, Harry, and Motoko. _Together_ …"

* * *

It was a few days later. Motoko Kusanagi had agreed to the offer of the Puppeteer, but wanted to settle her affairs first in case things went sour. Then, under the watchful eye of Section 9 and Harry, Motoko Kusanagi closed her eyes…and opened them again, _changed_.

Not substantially. She was still the same woman Harry had fallen for. But she was also greater than she once was. There was a strange sense of wonder in her expression as she looked around, as if seeing the world and people around her with new eyes.

"How do you feel, Major?" Aramaki asked.

Motoko smiled. "Strange…but not in a bad way. It's like…everything is new again. And I know so many things now that I am partially the Puppeteer. So many things we could use against the terrorists and cybercriminals we encounter. All this power…it's a little frightening, really." She chuckled softly, not anything remotely malevolent. If anything, it was slightly uneasy, but also with the same sense of wonder in her expression. She gingerly stood out of the chair she had been sitting in. "I feel like I could do anything."

Harry walked over to her and hugged her, with Motoko returning it. It felt like her, that same tender hug from a cyborg body that could easily squash him. He knew for certain that Motoko still existed. "Welcome back, Motoko. I mean, I can still call you that, right?"

"Of course. I am as much Motoko as I am the Puppeteer. We're not a split personality or anything. And I still love you, Harry, with all my heart." She separated from him, and gave him a grin. "This is the beginning, you know. The start of a new era. Of humanity and its offspring existing side-by-side. This is life and evolution in the making, not of revolution and destruction, but progress and cooperation."

Batou coughed quietly, trying to get their attention. "That's all good and all, but, well, what next?"

"Aside from doing my job with Section 9?" Motoko said with a shrug. "I don't know. But it'll be interesting to find out. The net is vast and infinite. And so too is the potential."

"Then let's explore the future together, Motoko," Harry said.

The two of them, along with the other members of Section 9, looked out of a nearby window, across the city of Newport. Maybe the future wouldn't be so bright. It certainly wouldn't be perfect. But there was no guarantee that it would be nothing but bleak darkness. It was just sheer, unadulterated potential.

And Harry and Motoko were going to ride that wave of potential towards the future. Even if it was an uncertain one, they were going to make damn sure it'd be a good one…

 **THE END…AND THE BEGINNING**

 **CHAPTER 9 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **So, there you have it. The final chapter of** ** _Newport Mage_** **. Yeah, it's a little weak for a finale, and the appearance of Death was a bit of an arsepull (though she was mentioned in a previous chapter), but given the changes from the original manga and the film version, well, it's hardly surprising. But I thought it best to end this fanfic here, on a high note, with promise for the future. I'm not going to be adapting the second manga volume or any other episodes of** ** _Stand Alone Complex_** **. I need more completed fics under my belt, and in any case, this is the longest crossover as of writing between Harry Potter and** ** _Ghost in the Shell_** **.**

 **Also, please don't get up me for suggesting a real name for the Major. Motoko Kusanagi, as mentioned earlier, is a pseudonym. I decided to give her a real name.**

 **Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed the ride while it lasted.**

 **1\. I based Death's appearance, as noted shortly afterwards, off Caster, aka Medea, from** ** _Fate/Stay Night_** **. Having done Death as looking like Lily Potter, as well as Death of the Endless in** ** _Verdant Magic_** **, I wanted to do something new, and I thought Caster looked almost reaper-like without actually being a Grim Reaper figure. Plus, her rather sad-looking face when she doesn't have her hood on helps with an entity who sees a lot of death.**

 **2\. I chose to keep Motoko's first name the same, while her surname, Ota, is actually the real surname of Masamune Shirow, whose real name is Masanori Ota.**


End file.
